A Fundamentalist dictatorship has ruled Iran for more than a quarter of a century. Since 1979, the people of Iran have become prisoners of an unelected and inhuman regime. So far, the people of Iran have experienced tremendous suffering from the mullahs’ reign of terror, some examples of which include, but are not limited to:

- More than 100,000 political executions
- Execution of teenagers without fair trial or even being identified.
- Execution of cruel mullahs’ fundamentalist laws such as throwing the victim off of a mountain
- Stoning to death (especially women).
- 600,000 arrests a year
- More than 500,000 political prisoners who have experienced 74 forms of different  physical/mental torture such as:
- Amputation of fingers
- Burning
- Gauging out of eyeballs
- Lashing
- Electrical shocks
- Hanging from the ceiling
- Rape of men and women including gang rapes (sometimes in front of family members and children)

- Protracting the war with Iraq, which resulted in more than a million casualties and persons with disabilities, in addition to billions of dollars in damages.

- A devastated economy with over 85% of its population under the poverty line, 50% unemployed, over 50% addicted to drugs and 1.5 million street children. These have given rise to the formation of new industries such as child trade for pedophile purposes, selling of body parts, and sex slaves. All this is occurring at a time that for every dollar the price of oil increases, Iran earns 1 billion dollars more in revenue.

- But the harshness of this brutality is most severe in the case of women. Under the dictatorship of the mullahs, women are considered to be sub-human whose primary function in society is restricted to giving birth and looking after children. Women are strictly prohibited to choose their own style of clothing; they cannot get divorced without first obtaining the permission of their husbands; they cannot even travel without the consent of their husbands. Mullahs regularly justify these kinds of laws by claiming that a man is naturally and biologically superior to women. For example, a former Iranian president, Rafsanjani, claimed that a woman’s brain is smaller than that of a man. In such a dark atmosphere, the pressure on Iranian women is such that well over 50% of the female population is ravaged.

Iran holds the most shocking statistics on the condition of women in the world:

- Over 10% of the adult female population has fallen in to prostitution, with Tehran alone housing some 600,000 prostitutes.
- 12% of women develop serious mental diseases
- Iran has the highest suicide rate in the world including the highest rates of immolation which resembles their protest and dismay.
- Nearly 2 million girls have run away from home.

The ruling mullahs have exclusive control over the drug and sex slave trades. At the same time, they brutally punish teenage girls for ridiculous made-up crimes. For example, recently a 13 year old girl was brutally lashed and condemned to being stoned to death for “having an affair”! This occurs even though it is a known fact that it is the mullahs themselves who have pioneered the selling of thousands of little girls to pedophiles abroad.

Another clear example was the case of a sixteen year old girl who was executed for having had a “sharp tongue”. (Or, you could say, was a smart-mouth)

The mullahs’ inhumanity and absolute intolerance for any opposition climaxed in the massacre of over 30,000 political prisoners in less than 2 weeks during 1988. Many of these prisoners had already served their sentences. In prison, they were asked only one question and the mullahs had decreed that any answer other than a strong yes would not suffice.

The question was: Will you or will you not accept the “rule of the Ayatollah” and denounce the PMOI (People’s Mojahedin Organization of Iran - the main opposition group in Iran)?

If the answer was yes, to prove his/her sincerity the prisoner would have to kill the next prisoner whose answer would be NO!!

So grave was the severity of this genocide that even Khomeini’s successor protested, and subsequently lost his position.

Tehran must be confronted for its violations of human rights. There have been over 100,000 executions in Iran in the past quarter century, including the massacre of 30,000 political prisoners in 1998. Torture is prevalent both as an instrument of punishment and as a means of extracting confessions from detainees. Some 170 forms of physical and psychological torture, including systematic flogging, mutilation, amputation, rape and mock executions, have been recorded in Iran’s prisons. Hundreds of thousands have been arbitrarily arrested on political grounds. Religious and ethnic minorities have been subjected to systematic discrimination and have suffered tremendously. 

Independent press is banned under the current regime. Journalists are not allowed to write or publish reports of dissent. There is no meaningful freedom of expression or freedom of the press where voices of dissent are summarily silenced and advocates of free speech are crushed and branded as enemies of the state. The state is clearly in violation of internationally recognised laws and those who challenge the government on above grounds have been subject to the most arbitrary and brutal forms of detention, torture, and long term imprisonment.  

Special “revolutionary” courts with absolute power have been set up as a mechanism for silencing criticism and political opposition. The courts have no juries for deliberation and no lawyers to defend the accused. Judges in these “revolutionary” courts, who are usually clerics, play the roles of prosecutor, defender, judge and jury. The system is loaded with terrible injustices as trials lack evidentiary standards, application of law is arbitrary and capricious and burdens of proof are random. These courts can alter or reverse any other decision that has been handed down by any other courts without any standard or judicial review. Records show that nearly a hundred thousand people, including political opponents, have been sentenced to death or killed since the mullah regime came into power. 

Under the ruling regime in Iran opposition groups are not allowed to express their dissent. More than a hundred thousand political prisoners have been killed and many are still in prison. A series of killings and 'disappearances' of independent writers and activists at the end of 1998 clearly revealed the involvement of state officials in suppression of dissent. Many illegal detention centers have been recently made known throughout the country. According to recent human rights organizations reports there are numerous detention facilities administered by paramilitary forces. The whereabouts of detainees are kept secret and during periods of detention individuals are always subject to torture and pressure to make confessions. Reports indicate an increase in public executions and floggings, which reflect the widespread campaign to intimidate and silence advocates of greater political freedom and critics of state policy. 

There are no safe guards to protect women in Iran. Women encounter systematic legal, political and social discrimination and violence. This sexual apartheid constitutes a form of oppression and persecution that has made women second-class citizens. Violence is not only condoned but also perpetrated by the government. Women’s dress, work, socialising, familial and intimate relationships, reproduction and sexuality are scrutinized and subject to control by the state.

Laws that criminalize fornication and adultery are disproportionately used against women and create an additional risk of persecution for women. Women’s right, freedom of travel and forms of cultural expression are severely circumscribed. Female prisoners are subject to sexual advances and violence. Unnecessary physical searches, and degrading pat downs by prison personnel, are ongoing routines. The regime’s failure to prosecute offenders, both of sexual violence and of domestic abuse, denies women equality before the law and the effective protection of the state. 

Death penalty and cruel and unusual punishments are systematically practiced by the regime. Hanging, stoning, lashing in public, flogging, parading are routine punishments of the government. The death penalty is routinely handed down in connection with charges of membership in opposition parties in addition to charges of murder, drug trafficking, and armed robbery. Numerous young people and children have been publicly hanged.  

Under international treaties signed by the regime,  Iran is prohibited from discriminating on the bases of 'race, colour, sex, language, religion, political or other opinion, national or social origin, property, birth or other status. There are a number of Christians, Jews, Zoroastrians and Baha’is who have been detained in recent years and prohibited from practising their religion. The same can be said of those who denounce religion or are atheist.  Similarly, ethnic minorities have been subject to state sponsored discrimination based solely on their membership in a particular ethnic group. The discrimination, deprivation, alienation or oppression rises to the level of persecution. 

Terrorism is the toll implemented by the ruling mullahs since 1979 in order to “export the revolution”. Khomeini institutionalized the "export of revolution" and creation of a global Islamic rule, not only as an ideal but as a specific goal and program within various parts of his constitution.

The foreword of the mullahs’ constitution reads, in part, "Given the context of Iran's Islamic Revolution, which was a movement for the victory of all the oppressed over the oppressors, it provides the ground for continuation of the revolution inside and outside the country, specifically in spreading international links to other Islamic and people's movements, tries to pave the way for the creation of unique global ummah (one nation) so the continuation of the struggle for the salvation of deprived and suffering nations can be settled." Another part of the foreword, under the headline "Ideological Army," reads, "The Army of the Islamic Republic and the Revolutionary Guards Corps carry not only the duty of protecting the borders but also ideological duty, i.e., Jihad for God and struggle to spread the rule of God's law in the world."

The Eleventh Act of the constitution reads, "The government of the Islamic Republic of Iran is obligated to base its general policy on the coalition and unity of the Islamic nations and to try to fulfill the political, economic, and cultural unity of the Islamic world."

The regime's top officials have repeatedly called for criminal acts or have taken responsibility for them. On the seventh anniversary of the U.S. Embassy takeover in Tehran, Hashemi Rafsanjani, the speaker of the Parliament at the time, said: "They hold us accountable for the blow the Americans received and the humiliation they suffered in Lebanon. We are indeed responsible [for it.]"

In a Friday prayer sermon on May 5, 1989, Rafsanjani said: "If for every Palestinian martyred by Israeli mercenaries, five American or French citizens are murdered, they would no longer commit such crimes. . . . The Palestinians might say, in that case, the world will call us terrorists. I say, however, do they not label you already?"

Mohsen Rafiqdoust, the minister of the Revolutionary Guards at the time, said: "In the victory of the revolution in Lebanon and many other places, the United States has felt the impact of our might on its ominous body, and knows that both the TNT and the ideology which in one blast sent to hell 400 officers, and soldiers at the Marine Headquarters have been provided by Iran. This is well understood by America: that is why they are so helpless in the Persian Gulf."

Mohsen Rezai, then commander in chief of the Revolutionary Guards, said: "The Muslims' fury and hatred will bum the heart of Washington someday and America will be responsible for its repercussions. . . . The day will come when, like Salman Rushdie, the Jews will not find a place to live anywhere in the world."

A. Support and Backing

The regime leaders' remarks on exporting terrorism and fundamentalism enjoy a huge financial and organizational backing from vast networks inside and outside the country. A large section of the mullah regime's intelligence Ministry is focused on terrorist activities and espionage abroad. Many Western intelligence agencies have attested to this fact

The Islamic Propaganda and Communication Organization is a huge system which has presence in dozens of countries and has hundreds of millions of dollars in its budget. Besides laying the groundwork for exporting terrorism and fundamentalism, it is engaged in recruiting Muslims and Arabs for the regime's terrorist squads. This organization was formed by merging five large organizations on Khamenei's order, and it operates under his supervision. The regime's embassies and representative offices abroad, as well as other institutions that are apparently involved in cultural and religious services abroad, serve the purpose of exporting terrorism and fundamentalism.

The dimensions of the mullah regime's atrocities have grown to such an extent that despite economic and political implications, the judiciaries of some countries, especially European countries, have stressed the role of the regime's leaders in those atrocities. Judge Roland Chatelain, the Swiss investigative magistrate, announced in 1990 that the assassination of Dr. Kazem Rajavi (an Iranian political activist living in Switzerland) was carried out by thirteen Iranian nationals, all of them holding Iranian regime service passports. He stated in June 1998, however, that this assassination was done by the mullahs' Intelligence Ministry.

A German federal court in Berlin, after a four-year-long trial regarding the killings at a Mykonos restaurant, asserted in its verdict that a committee of the highest ranking leaders of the Iranian regime-including the supreme leader, the president, the intelligence minister, and the foreign affairs minister-had ordered assassinations outside the country, including those on Mykonos. Earlier, the Berlin court had issued an arrest warrant for Mullah Ali Fallahian, the regime's intelligence minister.

B. Extent and Characteristic

The long arm of Iran's terrorism stretches to Turkey, Pakistan, and India in Asia; Lebanon, Saudi Arabia, and Kuwait in the Middle East; Belgium, France, Austria, Sweden, Italy, Cyprus, Spain, Germany, Switzerland, the United Kingdom, and Greece in Europe; and Argentina in Latin America. The extent to which the mullahs enjoy a free rein to maneuver and operate-whether in the framework of diplomatic institutions or business facilities or other suitable cover in any given country - is directly correlated to the frequency and the number of terrorist activities in those countries. One can certainly say that the mullahs' regime is neither inclined nor able to abandon terrorism as one of the primary instruments of its foreign policy. One Tehran-based foreign diplomat noted, "The difference between now and before is that they do not want to get caught." The mullahs may try to exercise more caution in pursuing their terrorism, but terrorism will remain intertwined with the mullahs' foreign policy.

The mullahs reached an agreement with Argentina in 1987 to obtain a supply of 20-percent enriched uranium to be used in one of their research centers in Tehran, which has a five-megawatt nuclear reactor. They also struck deals with both Argentina and Pakistan for the training of nuclear specialists.  In 1988, when the regime accepted the ceasefire in the Iran-Iraq War, the Guards Corps accelerated the IAEO's activities. It launched a top-secret project. Its initial budget was $200 million, and the project has been extensively funded ever since.  In 1992, they allocated $800 million to the project. In addition, a department in the Ministry of Defense was put in charge of acquiring nuclear-related technology from abroad. Two Iranian nuclear experts supervised the project.

Following Khomeini's death in 1989, Rafsanjani aggressively pursued the development of Iran's nuclear capabilities, attempting to attract nuclear scientists and specialists back to Iran by offering them substantial salaries. He also sought to secure nuclear equipment and technology from foreign countries. Nevertheless, the Guards Corps encountered serious difficulties because the efforts to obtain fuel and technology made little progress. Subsequently, a meeting was held in early 1990 among Rafsanjani and several other high officials involved in the nuclear project, to assess the progress and prospects of Iran's nuclear program. Afterward, Rafsanjani issued directives to step up the efforts to obtain technology and other necessary equipment from a variety of countries, including China, Pakistan, Argentina, and France.

In 1991, the regime publicly emphasized the need to obtain atomic weapons when Mohajerani, one of Rafsanjani's deputies said, "Since the enemy has atomic facilities, Islamic countries must be armed with the same capacity." As the speaker of the parliament in 1989, Rafsanjani underscored the need to obtain an atomic arsenal, stressing that Iran cannot ignore the reality of the modem world's atomic weapons

In the aftermath of the Persian Gulf War, when Germany informed Tehran that it would no longer continue its nuclear assistance to the mullahs' regime, Rafsanjani intervened personally. He vowed in public that the Islamic Republic would pursue its bid to acquire nuclear technology and warned Germany of losing Iran's markets.

In 1992, Rafsanjani met with a visiting official from China's Council of Science and Technology, the Chinese organization responsible for nuclear programs. Subsequently, a ten-year pact was signed between the two countries for scientific cooperation and the transfer of military technology. Trusted Iranian experts were also dispatched to Europe and elsewhere to infiltrate nuclear research institutions and later repatriate their knowledge to Iran. By mid-1992, Tehran had succeeded in signing an agreement with the Russian Federation to obtain two 440-megawatt nuclear reactors and buying a uranium-enrichment device from China. It also obtained a Cyclotron from the Belgian firm Ion Beam Applications. Although the company maintains that the equipment is generally used in medical research, nuclear industry experts say that "it could be adapted to enrich uranium."

On his trip to China in September 1992, Rafsanjani took along ten Iranian nuclear experts. These experts have been undergoing training there ever since. In addition, another twenty specialists are completing their training in China.

The primary objective of this trip was to obtain greater Chinese cooperation on technology and equipment and the dispatch of more Chinese nuclear experts to Iran. Rafsanjani's key nuclear goal during this trip and meetings with the Chinese president and officials was to speed up the completion of a nuclear center in southern Iran.

Hiring experts from other nations has been an important part of the mullahs’ nuclear project. At least fifty-four experts from foreign nations, including China, have been hired. The actual number of experts, however, is much greater. Dozens of Chinese and Russian experts also regularly travel to and from Iran. These experts are engaged in nuclear research, training Iranian specialists, supervising the construction of facilities, and setting up nuclear reactors.

The regime has also managed to engage-at very high salaries- Russian scholars to work in the training and research department of the Atomic Energy Organization in Tehran. These individuals are involved in research to speed up the "Great Plan."

To keep the nuclear program a secret, several parallel but independent and self-sufficient installations, including laboratories, workshops, and plants, are already under way in different parts of the country.

A glance at the mullahs' weapons procurement program and their high military budget shows that Tehran's arms purchases far exceed its defense needs. The arms build up is motivated by Iran's enormous domestic political and economic crises. "They are in rather desperate shape, and the answer is to look outside aggressively," said one Western expert. The offensive nature of the arms build up, in light of the clerics' continuing efforts to export fundamentalism, is a source of grave concern for regional and global peace. Western analysts worry that "Iran is conspiring to build a strategic strike capability."

Tehran's stockpiling of weapons has already changed the regional balance of power; the situation can only get worse if no international action is taken to ban arms sales to Iran.

Iran's ruling fundamentalists establish their thesis on the differences between the sexes and the conclusion that the male is the superior sex and hence the female is a slave at his service. By this approach, they negate a woman's human identity.

The fundamentalist mind considers physiological traits as the determining factors in its value system. Gender-based differences are used to justify sexual discrimination and inevitably lead to enmity towards women. This is the bedrock of the fundamentalistsآ’ rationale.

 Former mullahs’ President Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani said: "The difference in stature, vitality, voice, development, muscular quality and physical strength of men and women shows that men are stronger and more capable in all fieldsآ… Menآ’s brains are largerآ… These differences affect the delegation of responsibilities, duties and rights."

In the fundamentalists' view, women, as a second-class citizens, cannot and must not have any place in leadership, governance, judgeship and any serious post that deals with running societyآ’s affairs. They have gone as far as saying that "women must be kept uninformed to make sure they are obedient."

The gender-based jurisprudence solidifies discrimination and inequality not only in social and political arenas but also in civil rights of women.

Khomeini’s confidant, Ahmad Azari Qomi, who received several key judicial appointments, said the following on the marriage of virgin girls: "In Islam, the marriage of a virgin girl is not allowed without the permission of the father and the consent of the girl. Both must agree, but at the same time the rule of the divine leadership super cedes that of the father and the girl on the issue of marriage and vali-e faqih can enforce his view contrary to the opinion of the father and the girl." This means a mullah could sanction the forced marriage of the girl over her own objection and that of her father.

Throughout Khatami's Presidency (which began in 1997), for example, new restrictive laws and policies have been implemented to segregate women and men in education and health care. Parliament and other religious leaders continue to propose and enact a number of laws or policies that will adversely affect the health, education, and well being of women and girls in Iran. In practice, discriminatory laws and punishments were approved that affected mostly women.

On September 4, 1998, the mullahs’ parliaments passed a bill to segregate medical centers and hospitals. Billed as the Medical and Religious Conformity Act, it imposed gender segregation in hospitals and medical centers, and had a very serious impact on the already inadequate provision of health services for women.

The Act goes to extraordinary lengths to define areas of segregation, encompassing all medical and medically-affiliated centers, including hospitals, obstetrical clinics, convalescence centers, laboratories, outpatient clinics, doctors, consulting rooms and pharmacies. It also applies to the work place of other medical personnel, institutes of physiotherapy and electro-physiotherapy, hydrotherapy, clinical laboratories of diagnostics and research, radiology, nuclear centers, urban and rural health and treatment centers, injection and wound dressing cabinets or any establishment created or to be created under any label authorized by the Ministry of Health, therapy and medical education, departments in universities of medical science and all their technical, administrative and service personnel.

To implement this bill, which will cost (or millions of dollars), the Majlis ordered the formation of "Supreme Council of Adaptation" within the Ministry of Health. When tabled in the Majlis, the bill aroused extensive protests by women and the medical community at large.

In April 1998, repressive forces attacked a gathering of 1,800 surgeons in Tehran who had protested against this plan and brutalized many of them. Later in July, 2,200 doctors and students signed petitions, describing the plan as an insult to the medical profession.

Even those affiliated with Khatami’s faction admit that, "when we look closely, we see stagnation and even backsliding in certain areas." (Jamileh Kadivar, September 21, 2000).

During Khatami’s tenure 26 stoning verdicts have been issued, 18 of them against women. The last report by the UN Human Rights Commissionآ’s Special Representative on Iran described Iran as a "prison for women." Surely, Mr. Ahmadinejad's presidency will bring about an escalation to oppression, the like of which Iranian women are all too familiar with.

The claims about respect for the rights of women by a regime founded on misogyny are absolutely deceptive and designed to beguile the outside world. The founder of this regime, Khomeini, said unequivocally: "Women are sinister creatures. If a woman refrains from providing a favorable atmosphere to please her husband, he has the right to beat her, and he should make her submit by beating her more everyday."