The Committee of Concerned Scientists sent a letter to Ayatolla Ail Khamenei, Supremem Leader of Iran, protesting the 13 year sentence given to Abdolfattah Soltani, a prominent human rights attorney, for “spreading propaganda against the system,” and “endangering national security”.
Supreme Leader of the Islamic Republic of Iran
c/o H.E. Mr. Mohammad Khazaee,
Ambassador of Iran to the United Nations
Permanent Mission of the Islamic Republic of Iran to the United Nations
662 Third Avenue, 34th Floor
New York, NY 10017, USA
Via email to: iran@un.int
Via fax to: +1 (212) 867-7086June 29, 2012
Your Excellency:
We are an independent organization of scientists, physicians, engineers and scholars devoted to the protection and advancement of human rights and academic freedom for colleagues all over the world. We write now in concern for Mr. Abdolfattah Soltani.
Mr. Soltani is an internationally respected human rights lawyer and co-founder of the Defenders Human Rights Center in Iran with Nobel Prize-winner Shirin Ebadi. According to his daughter, Maede Soltani, in June of 2012, Mr. Soltani was sentenced to imprisonment for 13 years and banned for 20 years from exercising his profession. Soltani had previously been sentenced to 18 years on various charges including co-founding the Center for Human Rights Defenders, “spreading propaganda against the system,” and endangering national security. The appeals court reduced his sentence to 13 years but upheld his transfer from Tehran’s Evin Prison to a prison in the remote city of Borazjan.
According to Amnesty International, Mr. Soltani is being held as a prisoner of conscience solely for the peaceful exercise of his right to freedom of expression and association, including his work as a defense lawyer. His daughter’s report that he was asked to denounce Shirin Ebadi in return for a lighter sentence, a demand he refused, indicates that he was being tried for exercising his human rights. Mr. Soltani had previously been arrested in 2005 and 2009.
These actions constitute a disregard of international standards of due process, fair trial and detention as guaranteed in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, to which Iran is signatory.
We join other international human rights organizations and the Bar Association of the City of New York in urging you to intervene to overturn Mr. Soltani’s prison sentence and release him immediately and unconditionally.
Sincerely,
Eugene Chudnovsky Alexander GreerJoel Lebowitz
Walter Reich
Paul Plotz
Co-Chairs, Committee of Concerned Scientists
Copies to:
Head of the Judiciary
Ayatollah Sadeqh Larijani
Howzeh Riyasat-e Qoveh Qazaiyeh
(Office of the Head of the Judiciary)
Pasteur St., Vali Asr Ave. (south of Serah-e Jomhouri)
Tehran 1316814737, Islamic Republic of Iran
Email: larijani@dadgostary-tehran.ir or info@dadgostary-tehran.ir
The Honorable Hillary Clinton
United States Secretary of State
U.S. Department of State
2201 C Street NW
Washington, DC 20520 USA
The Honorable Navanethem Pillay
United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights
Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights
Palais des Nations
CH-1211 Geneva 10, Switzerland
Learn More
Iranian human rights lawyer jailed for 18 years, The Guardian, March 4, 2012
U.K. blasts Iran’s human rights record, UPI.com, June 19, 2012
Iran Must Overturn Jail Sentence of Prominent Lawyer and Human Rights Defender, Amnesty International, June 13, 2012
Abdolfattah Soltani, Iranian Human Rights Lawyer, Sentenced To 13 Years In Prison, Daughter Says, Huffington Post, June 12, 2012