SIGN PETITION on International Women's Day: Release Iranian women’s rights activist Bahareh Hedayat:
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http://e-activist.com/ea-action/action?ea.client.id=1770&ea.campaign.id=36150
Iran has tried to silence activist Bahareh Hedayat by sentencing her to 10 years in Iran’s notorious Evin Prison.
Encouraging the participation of women in student groups, promoting gender equality in the law, supporting political reform, opposing human rights violations—and speaking to the foreign media about all of these issues—led to a series of arrests and a lengthy prison term for 33-year-old Iranian women’s rights and student activist Bahareh Hedayat. Bahareh was arrested on December 31, 2009 in the wake of the 2009 presidential election, charged a range of “offences” related to her activism as part of the Campaign for Equality and as a member of Iran’s largest student organization, the Central Committee of the Office for the Consolidation of Unity. She was sentenced to 10 years in prison. Bahareh is a prisoner of conscience, detained solely for the peaceful expression of her political beliefs.
In an effort to deter other activists, authorities have regularly housed Bahareh in the harsh conditions of the prison’s “methadone” wing. She is regularly denied visits from her husband, a fellow student activist. Bahareh has suffered a variety of ailments which have been caused or exacerbated by prison conditions.
Iran has not succeeded in silencing Bahareh. Join us and call on authorities to free Bahareh Hedayat.
YOUR VOICE IS NEEDED NOW
In the face of adversity, Bahareh remains a beacon of light and hope. In a letter she wrote,
“With our hearts together, we united and although disadvantaged in an unfair battle, we fought against tyranny with empty hands. Not only in the streets but also in our hearts, we chose to be calm and collected, but also when confronted with cruelty, our sorrows multiplied. Until such a day as flowers blossom far and wide and the breeze of knowledge blows from every town and village, we envisioned our universities full of colorful and scented flower arches, not prison cells.”
Background:
Women in Iran face widespread discrimination under the law. For example, they cannot be judges or stand for the presidency. The government’s focus on education has led to a situation where the majority of university entrants are women. This caused concern among the authorities, resulting in a quota system aimed to reduce the number of women in universities, saying that the increased number of female graduates would contribute to the increase in the unemployment of men and would “harm family life.”
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