State of the World's Minorities 2007 - Iran

Iran is an ethnically and religiously diverse country whose Shia Persian majority amounts to only slightly more than 50 per cent of the population. In 2006, the Iranian government was embroiled in controversies over its nuclear programme and its backing of Shia militants in neighbouring Iraq, as well as Hezbollah in Lebanon. Receiving less attention was the country's ongoing repression of its many minority groups.

Sunni Arabs make up around 5 per cent of the Iranian population and are concentrated in the south-western, oil-rich province of Khuzistan along the Iraqi border. Over 2006, sectarian civil war in Iraq has led to enhanced calls for Sunni Arab autonomy within Iran, and even independence. Human Rights Watch reported rioting in April 2005 among Sunni Arabs in Khuzistan following a purported letter from a presidential adviser that recommended dispersal of the Arab population. The violence between protesters and police was followed by a series of bombings attributed to Sunni Arab activists in Tehran and Ahwaz in June and October 2005, and January 2006, which killed some 20 people and injured many more. Renewed confrontation between Sunni Arab protesters and Iranian police in March 2006 resulted in three deaths and hundreds of arrests. The Iranian government claims that unrest in Khuzistan is being stirred by British intelligence services across the border.

Kurds, who are mostly Sunni Muslims, make up around 10 per cent of the Iranian population and are concentrated in the north-west, adjacent to the Kurdish populations of Iraq and Turkey. The Iranian government has watched nervously over the course of 2006 as Iraqi Kurds have moved towards greater autonomy, fearing that its Kurds may seek to join an independent Kurdistan. Iranian security forces shot a young Kurd in July 2005, sparking a round of confrontations with the Kurdish minority, and tensions remained palpable through 2006.

Azeris form the largest ethnic minority in Iran at about 25 per cent. These Turkic-speaking Shias live concentrated along the border with Azerbaijan in the north-west of the country and in the capital Tehran. They are relatively well integrated into Iranian society, and Supreme Leader Ayatollah Khamenei is ethnic Azeri. Nonetheless tensions became evident in May 2006 when thousands of Azeris protested in north-west Iran following publication in a government newspaper of a cartoon insulting to Azeris. Government security forces fired on the protesters, killing five and injuring dozens.

The mostly Sunni Baluchi ethnic minority comprises around 2 per cent of the Iranian population, and lives in the impoverished Baluchistan region that straddles the Pakistani border. As Tehran opened a new military base in the area, Baluchi militants attacked a government motorcade in March 2006, killing over 20 people and taking others hostage.

Iran's record on religious freedom continued to be dismal. Baluchis, Kurds and Sunni Arabs decried the fact that not a single Sunni mosque has been permitted in the country, and public displays of Sunni religion remain banned. The 300,000 Baha'i of Iran remain subject to severe state discrimination. In September 2005, state-controlled media began an intense campaign against the Baha'i, whom Islamic clerics decry as heretics for believing that other prophets came after Mohammed. In March 2006, the UN Special Rapporteur on Freedom of Religion said she had received an October 2005 document in which Ayatollah Khamenei ordered the Iranian military to identify and monitor members of the Baha'i community. In May 2006, Human Rights Watch reported the arrests of 54 Baha'i youth volunteers in Shiraz. In February 2006, police and organized gangs broke up a peaceful protest among Nematollahi Sufis (dervishes) in Qom, who complained of a state order to relinquish their place of worship. Hundreds were injured and over a thousand detained. Amnesty International reported that, as of March, at least 173 Sufis remained in detention and that their lawyer had been arrested. The 25,000 Jews of Iran, the largest population in the Middle East outside Israel, continued their coexistence with the Shia Persian majority despite some provocations. In July 2006, during the Lebanon war, an Iranian newspaper falsely reported that Iranian Jews were celebrating Israeli independence day, which prompted extremists to target two synagogues. The community has watched nervously as new Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad has threatened to 'wipe Israel off the map' and questioned the dimensions of the Holocaust. His campaign promoting Holocaust denial culminated in an international conference held in Tehran in December 2006 – a move that met with widespread condemnation in Europe and the US.

Women in Iran remained subject to severe restrictions on their rights in accordance with Iran's interpretation of the tenets of Sharia law, including the requirement that married women receive their husbands' permission to work. Iran's ruling clerics rejected a suggestion from President Ahmadinejad at the time of the 2006 World Cup that women be allowed to attend football matches, ruling that it was un-Islamic for women to look at strange men's legs. Human Rights Watch reported that, in June 2006, police brutally assaulted hundreds of peaceful protesters in Tehran who were demanding an end to legally sanctioned discrimination against women.