Nov 10, 2006Articles: Human Rights Symposium to be held on January 27, 2007 in Toronto
By vanrozenheim
(Toronto, Canada) - The first Human Rights Symposium organized by Iranian Queer Organization (formerly PGLO) will take place in Toronto, Canada, on January 27, as organizers have announced.
This symposium will highlight the systematic marginalizing, stigmatizing and violating basic human rights of sexual, ethnic, religious and political minorities in Iran as well as women and children. It will also explore the ongoing struggle for civil and civic rights in Iran and investigate the myriad forms of discrimination, persecution and torture and their consequences for people living at the margin of Iranian society.
In its statement, the IRQO stresses that Iranian law defines homosexuality as crime punishable by death, denies women’s equal rights with men, persecutes political dissidents and civil and human rights activists, discriminates against Muslim minorities such as Sunnis, brands Baha’is as heretics, harasses Jews as potential collaborators with the state of Israel, deprives ethnic and linguistic minorities of speaking in their mother tongues, refuses to ban death penalty for minors and gives free hand to child abusers.
Iran’s violation of human rights has been repeatedly documented and reported by Human Rights Organizations such as Human Rights Watch and Amnesty International. Human Rights Watch in its 2002 reports that: “The Council of Guardians repeatedly blocked bills passed by the Parliament in such areas as women’s rights, family law, the prevention of torture, and electoral reform. The judiciary, deployed as one of the conservative’s strongest weapons, further undermined the rule of law with arbitrary closures of newspapers and imprisonment of political activists.”(http://pglo.net/english/hrw-report.pdf)
In this symposium, the expert panelists will discuss the current status of Iranian people who live at the border of Iranian social, political, religious, ethnic, linguistic, sexual, and gender lines. It further explores the different ways in which these categories are legally, culturally and socially constructed so as to perpetuate and maintain further marginalization and otherizing millions of people.
The aim of the symposium is to create a collaborative space with other Human Rights defenders and organizations to advocate human rights in Iran. As such it invites all the interested individuals and organizations to join hands with IRQO in its effort. The IRQO requests support for their struggle.
This symposium is an initiative of Iranian Queer Organization (IRQO) based in Toronto. All further information will be posted on the symposium web site: http://www.irqo.net/hrs/hrs2006.htm
