Education Mohsen Haji-Mirzaei announced on September 11th, 2019 that “If students say that they follow a faith other than the country’s official religions and this is seen as proselytising, they cannot continue attending school”.15 The project would give increased authority to schools to identify their students’ religions and to deny education to religious-minority students. Article 15 of the Constitution of the Islamic Republic of Iran stipulates that Persian is Iran’s official language and permits the “use of regional and ethnic languages in the press, the mass media, and the teaching of their literature at schools, alongside the Persian language.”16 However, the restrictive language of Article 15 does not fully protect the right of minorities to learn and teach in their mother tongue. Although Article 101 of the Charter on Citizens’ Rights recognises the right of citizens to learn, use and teach their own local language and dialect,17 the Charter is not legally binding. The Special Rapporteur on the human rights situation in the Islamic Republic of Iran raised concerns about reports of Kurdish, Ahwazi Arab and Azerbaijani-Turk (or Azeri-Turk) lacking access to education in their mother tongues. 18 19 These concerns were echoed by the UN Secretary General, 20 21 22 noting reports indicating that members of ethno-linguistic minorities, including the Azeri community as well as Arabs, were being denied the opportunity to teach their language in schools. 23 The reported state-imposed ban on Azeri-Turkish being taught in school would go some way in explaining such struggle. 24 Additionally, teachers need to obtain a stateissued permit to be able to teach the Kurdish language.25 Kurdish language teachers are reportedly persecuted.26 In 2016, reportedly up to 40,000 Ahwazi Arab children were denied access to education for failing the Farsi language proficiency test, even though Farsi was their second language.27 Lack of instruction in linguistic minorities’ mother tongues has reportedly 15 Iran Wire, 2019, https://iranwire.com/en/features/6303 Constitution of the Islamic Republic of Iran, English translation, https://irandataportal.syr.edu/wp-content/uploads/constitutionenglish-1368.pdf 17 Charter on Citizens’ Rights, English translation, http://president.ir/en/96865 18 Report of the Special Rapporteur on the situation of human rights in the Islamic Republic of Iran, January 2020, https://www.ohchr.org/Documents/Countries/IR/Report_of_the_Special_Rapporteur_on_the_situation_of_human_rights_in_the_ Islamic_Republic_of_IranA4361.pdf 19 See more : Association for the human rights of the Azerbaijani people in Iran, https://tbinternet.ohchr.org/Treaties/CRC/Shared%20Documents/IRN/INT_CRC_NGO_IRN_19735_E.pdf 20 IRNA News, www.irna.ir/news/83404283/ (in Farsi). 21 Report of the U.N. Secretary General, January 2020, https://www.ohchr.org/Documents/Countries/IR/Report_of_the_SecretaryGeneral_on_the_situation_of_human_rights_in_the_Islamic_Republic_of_IranA4320.pdf 22 Ibid. 23 Report of the U.N. Secretary General, August 2019, https://undocs.org/en/A/74/273 24 Center for Human Rights in Iran, https://iranhumanrights.org/2019/03/irans-intelligence-ministry-slaps-azeri-rights-activistwith-new-charges-claim-hes-organizing-protests-from-prison/ 25 Report of the Special Rapporteur on the situation of human rights in the Islamic Republic of Iran, July 2019, https://undocs.org/A/74/188 26 Ibid. 27 UNPO, https://unpo.org/article/19590 16 3