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Spenta
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Joined: 04 Sep 2003 Posts: 1829
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Posted: Sun Mar 07, 2004 12:28 pm Post subject: Shame on the UK for deporting dieing Asylum Applicants! |
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The Filthy Colonialist British are Deporting Dying Iranian Asylum Applicants for Execution to their Mullah Buddies Yet Again!
The shameful support of the Islamist Iranian Mullahcracy by the British government is perhaps one of the most repulsive acts of modern day Neo Colonialism in our world!
The way and manner in which the British government installed this barbaric Mullahcracy and has continued to act as its protector and champion is offensive to any democratic minded person anywhere in our world!
The shameless British are responsible for 25 years of Islamist genocide, torture, mass imprisonment, despotic rule, oppression, stonings, amputations, poverty, ethnic cleansing, misogyny, and child molestation of the Iranian people in the hands of the Mullahcracy they installed and continue to sponsor, all in return for the mass looting of Iran's oil and gas.
Even though their own laws prevent an asylum applicant from being deported if they risk death and torture they are deporting 3 Kurdish dissidents to Iran for execution. Why? The men are scheduled for execution, and the British have no intention of doing anything other than handing them over to their Mullah buddies for execution. I don't support all the political beliefs of these individuals, however I cannot imagine how the British government could break their own laws in order to accomodate the Mullahs' massacres! The Greed and avarice of the Colinilaist British is frankly offensive to any human being in our world!
The British are the single most disgusting and Repulsive Colonialists of all time, they have no honor, no decency, no humanity of any kind. Shame on the Filthy British and their Filthy Islamist Colonialist Mullahcracy!
Ban all British Products.
Do not buy anything made in the U.K.
Use every chance you have to educate the world about the filthy Colonialist practices of the British government in Iran
Write to the British government letting them know what the Iranian people think about the Islamist Colonial hell that they have created in Iran, and what you think about their shameful and repulsive sponsorship of the Mullahcracy, and their shameful abuse of Iranian asylum applicants!
Demonstrate outside British embassies all over the world on behalf of the oppressed people of Iran.
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http://www.sundayherald.com/40451
Execution threat for hunger strikers facing deportation
By Neil Mackay, Home Affairs Editor
07 March 2004
THE three Kurdish refugees who are on hunger strike in Glasgow in protest at their deportation to Iran are being expelled from the UK despite the Labour government’s policy of never deporting anyone to a country where they might face the death penalty.
The men – Faroq Haidari, Fariboz Gravindi and Mokhtar Haydary – are now on their 17th day of hunger strike. The three, who have sewn up their mouths, have all refused medical intervention.
They argue they were dissidents in Iran as they supported democratic reforms and a form of home rule for Kurds. Habib Kharabi, the uncle of hunger-striker Mokhtar Haydary, was executed by the regime for political activities.
The US routinely refers to Iran as part of the “Axis of Evil” and the Foreign Office has highlighted public executions, trials behind closed doors and the suppression of dissent in the country. A recent fundamentalist crackdown in Iran forced the fledgling reformist movement underground.
The Home Office has previously publicly stated that “the policy of this government is that the Home Secretary, David Blunkett, will not allow anyone to be deported who is knowingly going to face torture or the death penalty.”
Yet the Home Office said the men would be deported regardless of their protest.
SNP leader John Swinney said: “ There seems to be a direct danger to these men if they are sent back to their home country and this case is evidence that there are weaknesses in the current asylum system .”
Tom Harris, the Labour MP for Cathcart – the area where the three men are residing – says he is to fight for them to stay in the UK . Harris, who has visited the men, said: “I asked them to stop their hunger strike immediately.” He added: “Their case is not helped by what they are doing, in fact it is positively harming their case.”
Harris said the men had “ strong arguments to stay”, but the Home Office would not be able to take “an objective view” of the case because it would look like the government had been “strong-armed” into reversing its decision.
Harris has already written twice to the Home Office and spoken to ministers. “I’ve said, in my view, that due to the political deterioration in Iran, they should at least give them temporary leave to stay.”
Mike Watson, Labour MSP for Cathcart, said he was fully behind Harris. However, the Scottish Executive has refused to comment claiming immigration is a matter for Westminster .
Glasgow City Council, which is to evict the men, said it was legally bound to throw them out . A spokesman said: “I know this sounds cold and heartless given the situation, but this is our only course of action. We aren’t involved in the decision- making process. ”
The council is in discussion with the National Asylum Support Service (NASS) over what to do with the men – two of whom are barely conscious – when they are evicted.
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http://www.sundayherald.com/40416
‘SOMETIMES YOU HAVE TO RISK DEATH TO LIVE …’
07 March 2004
As a hunger strike by three failed asylum seekers in a Glasgow bedsit nears its tragic end, one of the men tells Home Affairs Editor Neil Mackay why they were driven to it
THERE is an elegant, leafy street on the suburban southside of Glasgow called Cathkin Road. Inside a ground-floor flat in one of the houses that line the street, three men are lying on blood-stained mattresses on the floor of a squalid single room, their lips sown shut by their own hands, slowly and quietly starving themselves to death.
After 17 days of hunger strike, two are almost permanently unconscious. The third is permanently awake, frozen into insomnia, he says, by fear during his self-imposed ordeal. These men – Faroq Haidari, 32, Fariboz Gravindi, 30 and Mokhtar Haydary, 34 – are all Kurds who have fled from Iran, a part of the so-called Axis of Evil. They have all sought asylum in the UK and they have all been refused, and now they are all to be deported. They all believe that if they return to Iran they will be executed. All three are also to be evicted from their home and thrown out on to the street by Glasgow City Council pending their final removal from the UK.
Their hunger strike has a brutal simplicity, says the insomniac Haidari . “We cannot go home. If we go home, we will be killed. Better to die here like men through our own choice, than to be executed in Iran.”
Haidari’s lips, like those of his friends, are strung together with three stitches. His stitches – put in with an ordinary sewing needle – are looser than those of the other two men, allowing him to part his lips half an inch so he can make himself understood. In this flat where the Kurds have chosen to die, a series of friends and wellwishers, mostly campaigners from pro-refugee organisations, come and go, giving their love and support. There are tears as they leave. “We’re watching people live out the last days of their lives,” one says. “Who wouldn’t cry?”
On Thursday afternoon, Haidari finds the strength to talk for about an hour. In the early hours of that morning, Gravindi and Haydary had lost consciousness. Haidari had feared they were dead. An Iranian friend, who is also to be deported and who watches over them day and night, had called an ambulance, which rushed them to the Victoria Infirmary.
While Haidari talked , his friends were put on saline drips. They awoke after an hour and angrily ordered the medics to stop treatment. Everyone – doctors, friends, campaigners – pleaded with them not to refuse hospital help, but they insisted on no medical intervention. The doctors had no option but to agree. Later the men returned home and almost immediately slipped back into unconsciousness.
In those few hours, while his friends were away, Haidari talked about his life and the life of his friends; about what brought three men from thousands of miles away to a dirty bedsit in Glasgow to die. While he talked, he dabbed his mouth with a tissue, wiping away the blood that leaks from his lips as the stitches pull at his flesh; his face a grimace of pain.
Haidari slowly began. “We lived in fear of our government in Iran. When we escaped, we escaped torture, injustice, execution and persecution. That is why I cannot understand why we have been refused asylum in your country. We have no option left but this hunger strike. Believe me when I say we are prepared to die. We are Kurds. The Iran regime persecutes us politically, religiously and ethnically. To live longer in this world, we had to escape. Put yourself in my shoes. If you were in danger, would you run?
“There have been many executions of Kurds since the 1979 Islamic revolution. The UK accepts that Iran is dangerous, that it is not a democracy, that there is no freedom. But still they want to send us home. People – my family – are too scared even in their own houses to talk about the government. It is like Nazi Germany.
“When I stitched my lips, the pain was extraordinary, but I wanted to show the UK government that the human rights they talk about don’t exist. We are saying, ‘We’ve had enough of talk; no-one will listen to us anyway.’
“We are not doing this for benefits from your welfare state. Who would suffer this for such a thing? We are doing it to save our lives; to show politicians that we deserve asylum. There is a big difference between your government and the people. We have so many good friends among Scots people. If I could talk to [Home Secretary] David Blunkett I’d say to him, ‘Put yourself in my position, not for a year, not for a month, but just for a week. If you knew you were in danger, what would you do to change your life?’
“No-one wants to die. I’m young. I’d like to ask the ordinary people of Scotland to make the politicians listen to us. They must understand what we are going through. I just hope that Scottish politicians can put pressure on the UK parliament. I live here in Scotland so they must be able to act for me. It’s scary thinking about what we are doing. But if anything happens to us then your government is responsible.
“We are not doing this because of religion. We are Muslims and respect our religion, but we believe that religion and politics do not mix. We are doing this because we are hopeless, we have no-one to help us and nowhere to go. Sometimes you have to risk death to live.
“Time passes so slowly here. It’s strange, but this is actually boring. I think of death, but I have to be brave. I’m tired. I can’t walk. My mind plays tricks on me. I haven’t slept in 24 hours. I was in hospital for 48 hours last week because I had refused all water for many days, now I am drinking because I need to keep this fight going. I’m also very lonely. Day by day I am forgetting how to eat; how I used to eat.
“We have had no contact with the Home Office since this began more than two weeks ago. They don’t care – that is shameful. I won’t give up. When Kurds say something we stand by it even if it means the loss of our lives. Kurdish people are hard. We stand by our promises. I’m scared that if my parents know what is going on that it will kill them. I love them very much. The first time I was away from my family was when I arrived in Britain. Now I’m living like this.’’
What did take this young man away from the family he loves? All three came from Kermanshah on the border with Iraq. The city is still mined from the Iran-Iraq war. As children they grew up seeing public executions. Hangings, beheadings, women stoned to death. One of the hunger-strikers, Mokhtar Haydary’s uncle, Habib Kharabi, a member of the Kurdish Democratic Party, was executed by the regime. Haidari grew up in a prosperous, well-educated middle-class family. They sold televisions, fridges and CD players for a living. The one thing his family did lack, however, was their own culture. Writing in Kurdish was banned, he says, and he is more proficient at writing in English than Kurdish.
All three were part of the so-called “reformist generation” – young students in the 1990s who wanted to roll back the power of the ayatollahs. They wanted a centrist democratic state and were drawn to the moderate “third way” politics of Western leaders like Tony Blair and Bill Clinton. They also wanted some degree of autonomy for the Kurds. None were separatists, instead they sought a form of devolved home rule.
The three hunger-strikers all belonged to a group that campaigned for democracy which was infiltrated and betrayed by state spies. These men were not revolutionaries – violence wasn’t their way – so, faced with repression, they decided to flee. A number chose to go to Norway, and secured almost immediate asylum. Others, like the three hunger-strikers, opted for Britain, attracted by New Labour and its much-vaunted claims of an “ethical foreign policy”.
One night, three years, ago, Iranian security forces came to arrest Haidari. He ran. When the three fled, they handed themselves – and $5000 each – to a “people smuggler”. It took a month, locked mostly in a closed container, to travel across Europe. They landed in Dover in 2001. “It is not hard to be persecuted by the Iranian government if you’re Kurdish,” Haidari whispers. “If you say anything against them you will be arrested, tortured and jailed. There will be no lawyer, no justice. I left because I was in serious danger. This story belongs to all of us. It is not just about me. All three of us escaped; risked our lives. In fact, this is not a story – this is our reality.”
Since he began his fast, Haidari has lost around three stones and only seen a doctor three times. “I don’t need a doctor,” he says. “I need a solution.”
Margaret Woods, of the Glasgow Campaign to Welcome Refugees, is something of a mother figure to these dying men. “There are 170 refugees now homeless in Glasgow as they’ve been thrown out of their flats because their asylum claims have been turned down. Like these men, they all face deportation – many to places where they could be executed. I am terribly distressed by this. These are human beings reduced to an act as desperate as this in Glasgow, in a grotty bedsit, in a country I was raised in. It is so disillusioning. What is happening goes against all ideas of human rights.
“Imagine being one flight away from torture in a hell-hole of a prison. I don’t advocate what they’re doing, but I understand why they’ve been driven to it. I’ve got to know them and they are utterly determined to die if they are not allowed to stay. Before Fariboz Gravindi lost consciousness, he said to me, ‘I want to make a statement before I die: there is no freedom in this country.’
“It seems to me the only freedom left to them is the freedom to die. That’s an appalling indictment of our society.”
On Friday, Bill Speirs, general secretary of the STUC, arrived to see the hunger strikers. He was visibly shaken. “Here are three young men who, if they were Scots, would be part of New Labour. They’ve been reduced to this state rather than face going home to die in some horrible way; they would rather die horribly here. This is real. It’s vital that the Home Office overturns its decision to expel them. What gets me is that we are sending them back to the Axis of Evil. Think of the double standards.”
Speirs urged the men to take water. He said: “It is a legitimate tactic in a hunger strike. They want to win; they don’t want to die. They want a result; we don’t want martyrs.” He added: “The responsibility for this lies with Blair and Blunkett. If these three men win, they will have secured a victory that will always be remembered; if they die it won’t be on Blunkett’s conscience – he doesn’t think like that.
“I’m very, very shocked by what I’ve seen here, and I’m angry . We are not a country that needs to behave like this towards people who came here believing we would help them. What’s happening in that room is a nightmare. In Glasgow, people are starving themselves to death with sewn-up lips. It is a blot on our country that these men have been forced to this; it’s a stain on us that they are prepared to die because of the way they have been treated by a Labour government. Scotland must look on this with sympathy. I remember when David Blunkett was a liberal campaigner. Why does this brutal policy exist?”
07 March 2004 |
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Khorshid
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Joined: 28 Aug 2003 Posts: 459
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Posted: Mon Mar 08, 2004 6:34 pm Post subject: |
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The British, of course, don't give damn. And it is hard to persuade other states NOT to look after their own interests and start adhering to some basic moral principles, such as UN's HR charter, to which britain is a signatory!
Look at Canada. Months after the Ziba Kezemi scandal, the Canadians refused to help Mohsen Mofidi, who ended up being lashed to death. If this turns into a real scandal, which the Canadians have so far made sure it does not, then the brits may think twice before creating one of their own.
My point, then, is that instead writing idiotic one-line commentaries on this or other boards, members could write letters/e-mails/faxes to proper authorities and THEN share that with us here.
I can tell that most people on this board are relatively young. Don't let that fact hold you back.
Thank you again Dearest Spenta.
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asher
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Joined: 03 Mar 2004 Posts: 305 Location: Portland, Oregon
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Posted: Mon Mar 08, 2004 9:11 pm Post subject: |
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To: uk@un.int
I am writing to protest the threatened deportation of three Iranian dissidents, now on hunger strike, to certain torture and death in the Islamic Republic of Iran.
Britain should be opposing the criminal regime of the mullahs, not appeasing it. I urge the United Kingdom to act in accord with the highest traditions of the civilized world and afford safety to those seeking refuge within its borders.
Asher Abrams |
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redemption
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Joined: 30 Dec 2003 Posts: 1158 Location: California
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Posted: Tue Mar 09, 2004 9:00 am Post subject: |
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Good work Asher - the British policymakers must choose the right side and stop supporting the Mullah Terrorists..!!!! _________________ IRANIANS UNITE
PERSIA LIVES ON!!
FREE IRAN NOW! |
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kambiz
Joined: 18 Aug 2005 Posts: 4
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Posted: Mon Sep 05, 2005 10:19 pm Post subject: well done spenta |
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Marvellous writing, well spotted and expressed.
I agree with you compltely,
Shame on British, greedy blood suckers who know nothing except money, who do not have any human value or dignity.
They even killed their own Princess (Diana) because she was pregnant with an Egyptian (Alfadeh's son). |
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Oppenheimer
Joined: 03 Mar 2005 Posts: 1166 Location: SantaFe, New Mexico
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Posted: Mon Sep 05, 2005 11:39 pm Post subject: |
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Hey Korshid,
If your are the same Korshid that posted occasionally on SMCCDI, hello again.
On Canada, my understanding is they are about to table a UN resolution on human rights, directed against the regime directly..in about a week to ten days time.
I posted the item here on one of these threads....too hard to keep track of them all....but it was only a couple days back....check my posts, you'll find it...
Been doing the letter thing....you may find them as well among my posts...
And an interesting UK foreign office statement by Straw mentioning the abysmal long term human rights record of the regime in terms of EU attitude....dated Sept 1.
Rather than re-post everything, for redundancy...it's probably just as easy for anyone interested to look through my posts...they should be self evident, and easy to find.
SMCCDI forum is back up again BTW. Hope you are well.
Ba sepaas,
Oppie |
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Oppenheimer
Joined: 03 Mar 2005 Posts: 1166 Location: SantaFe, New Mexico
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Posted: Tue Sep 06, 2005 12:33 am Post subject: |
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The way and manner in which the British government installed this barbaric Mullahcracy....
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Dear Spenta,
In my mind it would have been much better had the Brits and EU in general implemented sanctions as the US did years ago....their "stable" trade has collapsed in the face of "monkey shines", and an inevitable blind spot leftover from colonial mindset that the hand they feed won't bite them....
Well waking up to reality is a long hard road....just maybe now they are starting to get a grip....but what I wanted to ask you is this:
How is it that folks blame the Brits and US president Carter, when the Iranian people themselves in '80 had supported the instalation of the Islamic Republic of Iran? Surely niether the Brits or the US could have played a larger role than the Iranian people....
Seems today no mention is made of the vast support of Russia or China, via arms, energy, or economic dealings with the IRI...by the opposition..
and I look at Russian influence in Iranian affairs over the years and it had a hell of an impact, as well generating a cold-war response by the west after WW2.
Thing is in today's current circumstance, where the IRI has now through terrorism, nuclear mischief, and it's long history of abuse of its citizens...as well as the fact the world has changed in mindset significantly over the years....the IRI has now become an international problem....and it kind of puts the Iranian opposition in a hard place....because as the IRI is dealt with on an international level, the opposition has no representitive voice in the UN per se.
There's a heck of a lot of frustration due to total lack of control in your people's future....I understand this.
I keep telling folks to have a bit of patience, as the next weeks should tell the tale of exactly how the future relations with the IRI will be...whether that be with the EU, or UN.....
It's not just the Iranian opposition against the regime at this point....the opposition as a whole has made huge progress in the last year....the illegitimacy of the regime was exposed to the light of day in this last election....the question of referendum has been dealt with and is no longer a point of division...."regime change" is the path chosen by most opposition groups.....in common cause and solidarity despite differences on how to get there from here....
I say have hope, because there is room for it, despite the crackdowns on dissent (which further expose the regime's nature to the eyes of the world).
The main problem I see is (and much mistrust for) the way the international community will deal with this regime in the coming weeks and months...
All I can suggest is wait for it, and anticipate miracles....without expecting any.
Takes time to build consensus with nations...US has been hard at it for years regarding the threat the IRI poses.
While it is true that nations usually think for their own security first and formost, the world has had ample reason to come to grips with the fact that everyone's freedom and security is interconnected, and there just isn't room in the world left for dictators and tyrants..or totalitarian regimes that support terrorism and cop a nut at the thought of having a nuke or three.
Maybe I'm wrong, but from an observational standpoint, the Iranian opposition has come light years in little over a year since I've been taking part in forums such as this one.
In 2004 it seemed no one but the US was listening....
"Axis of Evil" was no joke...and defined reality, even if my preference would have been an "Axis of Union" speech, bringing the international community together to face situations such as the "Axis of Evil" pose.
Rather than the split in US/EU relations over Iraq.
Some question the removal of Saddam, and say "Why not Iran first?"
Well, besides the mass graves.....Iran is now "bookended" by two fledgling democracies, and litterally surrounded on all sides by US/Coalition allies in the war on terrorism....puts a hell of a lot of pressure on the IRI....and that can only help the opposition reach its goals.
Were the UN to go with sanctions...or further....as seems very probable soon...I think the question folks in the opposition must consider now is how to implement regime change now the international community stands against the regime, and with the Iranian people.
I stress here if it cannot succeed at that point, then regime change may be completely out of your hands if it comes to a military solution to the IRI.
I see a lot of stuff, read , do the reasearch, and what I see happening gives me hope that this is exactly what you folks can look forward to...SOON. But ask yourselves this..."What do we do when we get what we wanted for years?"
There will come a crucial test....failure may mean a regional war at some future point. Given the mindset of the IRI, I'd say plan on it, if you don't succeed with regime change from within. |
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