Extension of Mandate for Fact-Finding Committee and Special Rapporteur on Human Rights for Iran
The United Nations Human Rights Council extended the mandate of the Fact-Finding Committee and Special Rapporteur on Human Rights for Iran for one year.
The Fact-Finding Committee and Special Rapporteur on Human Rights, which had been tasked with investigating the deadly crackdowns on nationwide protests in Iran, had their mandate extended by the United Nations Human Rights Council for another year, and the council issued a statement in this regard.
In a statement released by the United Nations Human Rights organization, it was noted that this body decided to extend the mandate of the Fact-Finding Committee to ensure that evidence related to human rights violations in connection with the protests that began on September 16, 2022, is fully documented, verified, and preserved. The United Nations Human Rights Council, with 47 members present in this session, extended the above-mentioned two mandates on Thursday, April 4, with 24 votes in favor, 8 votes against, and 15 abstentions.
Article 18 Organization and more than 40 international and Iranian human rights organizations, including Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch, released a statement on March 19, 2024, calling on member states of the United Nations Human Rights Council to extend the mandate of the United Nations Special Rapporteur and the Fact-Finding Committee of this body.
Human rights organizations, while emphasizing the continued violation and severe repression of millions of citizens including ethnic and religious minorities, women, girls, Baluchis, Christians, Baha’is, Gonabadi Dervishes, and Sunni Muslims, wrote: “The restoration of the Special Rapporteur’s mandate is necessary, because the human rights crisis in Iran has been severe and includes ongoing crimes against international law and serious human rights violations that affect millions of people in Iran and restrict a wide range of rights.”
“Sara Hussein,” Chair of the Fact-Finding Committee on human rights violations during the 2022 protests in Iran, also attended this session and while referring to widespread and systematic attacks on women and girls, human rights defenders, torture, extrajudicial executions, sexual violence, and rape, said: “These acts in some of these cases of serious human rights violations reached the level of crimes against humanity.”
“Javaid Rehman,” the United Nations Special Rapporteur, also on March 19, 2024, presented his sixth report on human rights violations in Iran at the meeting of this organization’s Human Rights Council in Geneva, and expressed deep concern about the continued harassment and arbitrary detention of individuals belonging to unrecognized religious and faith minorities in Iran, including Baha’is, Christians, and members of Gonabadi Dervishes.
