against Islam and the Islamic Republic of Iran,”19 a charge that is regularly levelled against
certain religious minorities and other ethnic groups.
While it is technically possible to file non-discrimination complaints with the administration of
justice court, the Parliament’s Article 90 Commission, and Committees for supervisions of
implementation of the Law on Respect for Legitimate Freedoms and Citizenship Rights, there is
no evidence that judicial actions are taken in response to complaints of denial of fundamental
human rights and freedoms on the basis of ethnic, religious, cultural or linguistic identities
Ethnic minorities, especially Kurds and Balochis, are over-represented in death penalty statistics.
Many of the offenses carrying the death penalty, in particular drug-related offenses and national
security offenses, are among the charges most commonly used to target and convict minorities.
These charges can carry the death penalty, especially in national security cases.20 Due to this,
minorities might face execution for practicing their culture and/or religion. Impoverished and
marginalized minorities have been over-represented among those executed for drug offenses.
Additionally, Kurdish political prisoners charged with national security offences represent
almost half of the total number of political prisoners. Overall, half of those executed for
affiliation with a political party or a banned group between 2010 and 2018 were Kurds, while a
quarter were Balochis and over one-tenth Arabs. There have also been serious concerns over the
secret executions of Ahwazi Arab prisoners in 2018, as Ahwazi Arab activists have reported that
22 men were executed in secret in 2018.21 Reports received from Kurdistan of Iran alone indicate
that between 2014 and 2019, 449 Kurdish border couriers were shot at and killed by Iranian
border authorities, with another 554 couriers injured primarily due to border shootings.22 Though
the Iranian government doesn’t publish accurate labor statistics which could be used to create
employment to population ratios by target populations, civil society reports suggest that Iran’s
minority populations are constantly being denied equal access to employment opportunities.23
C. LGBTI Community
Article 19 of the Constitution of the Islamic Republic of Iran guarantees that all people enjoy
equal rights, “whatever the ethnic group or tribe to which they belong” and that “colour, race,
language, and the like, do not bestow any privilege.”24 However, the Constitution lacks an
19
Ibid.
Human Rights Watch: https://www.hrw.org/news/2020/07/10/iran-death-penalty-protest-related-charges
21
Amnesty International, Iran: “Fears mounting for detained Ahwazi Arabs amid reports of secret executions”, 13 November
2018, accessible at: https://www.amnesty.org/en/latest/news/2018/11/iran-fears-mounting-for-detained-ahwazi-arabs-amidreports-of-secret-executions/
22
KMMK-G, Human Rights Violations in Kurdistan of Iran, April 2020, accessible at: https://kmmkge.org/sd/wpcontent/uploads/2020/05/KMMK-G-2019_Annual_Report-for-the-Attention-of-the-OHCHR-Desk-of-the-UNSpecial-Rapporteur-on-theSituation-of-Human-Rights-in-Iran.pdf
23
https://minorityrights.org/wp-content/uploads/2018/03/Rights-Denied-Violations-against-ethnic-and-religious-minorities-inIran.pdf
24
Constitution of the Islamic Republic of Iran, http://www.iranchamber.com/government/laws/constitution_ch03.php
20
4