Iran’s Child Rights Report Questioned
A report on the implementation of the Convention on the Rights of the Child in the Islamic Republic of Iran, submitted by 21 non-governmental organizations defending children’s rights, including the Kurdistan Human Rights Association – Geneva, with the presence of Timour Aliyassi, representative of this Kurdish institution at the United Nations, was discussed and reviewed.
At the seventy-first session of the Committee on the Rights of the Child of this global body, the issues of education in mother tongue (Kurdish) and the dangers of mine explosions for Kurdish children were on the committee’s agenda.
The submitted report indicated that Ms. Winter, spokesperson of the Committee on the Rights of the Child, in Monday’s session addressed the Iranian government delegation, asking what harm education in the mother tongue for children of ethnic groups in Iran would cause to the Persian language?
The head of the Iranian delegation present at the United Nations meeting, in response to the proposal of the Kurdistan Human Rights Association, claimed that only Persian is the official and national language, and we are striving to teach other local and ethnic languages in schools.
Mr. Nelson, another member of the UN Committee on the Rights of the Child, also questioned the Iranian government delegation about the dangers of mines that threaten the lives of children.
Timour Aliyassi, a human rights activist and participant in the meetings on the 21st and 22nd of Dey month, told the Kurdistan News Agency: In addition to the mentioned topics, forced compliance of girls with hijab requirements in schools, execution of children under eighteen years old, the situation of street children, sexual harassment and violence against children, and others were reviewed at the seventy-first session of the UN Committee on the Rights of the Child.
The head of the Iranian delegation, in defense of the government’s programs, stated that we are striving to reduce discrimination against children’s rights in Iran to zero by 2030, a statement that drew a reaction from the head of the UN Committee on the Rights of the Child, who told the Iranian government delegation: You made similar statements ten years ago.
Abbassi, head of the Iranian delegation, in response to questions raised about the execution of children in Iran, says that we consider the legal age of accountability to be 15 years old, and based on a law passed three years ago, individuals under 18 years of age are tried in special courts, and are punished only if they understand the nature of the actions they have committed.
Such statements from the Iranian delegation come as, according to the same UN Committee on the Rights of the Child report, there are 160 convicted children sentenced to death in Iran.
Regarding the existence of female circumcision among girls in Kurdistan, the representative of the Deputy for Women and Family Affairs of the Iranian Presidency, while acknowledging such a problem, spoke of “the freedom of Sunnis, particularly followers of the Shafi’i school,” and justified it.
The Iran Child Rights Report for 2016 was heavily criticized by human rights defenders, who described it as far from the realities of Iran and Kurdistan.
