Abdorrahman Boroumand Center

for Human Rights in Iran

https://www.iranrights.org
Memorial
Omid, a memorial in defense of human rights in Iran
One Person’s Story

Mohammad Qaderi

About

Age: 31
Nationality: Iran
Religion: Presumed Muslim
Civil Status: Single

Case

Date of Killing: August 13, 1993
Location of Killing: Kırşehir, Turkey
Mode of Killing: Extrajudicial shooting

Human rights violations in this case

Extrajudicial killings

The Islamic Republic of Iran has a long history of politically motivated violence in Iran and around the world. Since the 1979 Revolution, Islamic Republic operatives inside and outside the country have engaged in kidnapping, disappearing, and killing a large number of individuals whose activities they deemed undesirable. The actual number of the victims of extrajudicial killings inside Iran is not clear; however, these murders began in February 1979, with the murder of Parviz Sayyah Sina, an Anglican Bishop, and have continued since then, both inside and outside Iran. The Abdorrahman Boroumand Center has so far identified over 500 extrajudicial killings outside Iran attributed to the Islamic Republic of Iran.(1)

Dissidents have been assassinated by the agents of the Islamic Republic outside Iran, where one of the first assassinations, that of a Navy Officer, Shahriar Shafiq, took place in Paris in December 1979. These assassinations have taken place in countries such as the Philippines, Indonesia, Japan, India, and Pakistan in Asia; Dubai, Iraq, and Turkey in the Middle East; Cyprus, France, Italy, Austria, Switzerland, Germany, Norway, Sweden, and Great Britain in Europe; and the United States across the Atlantic Ocean. In too many cases, states have failed to guarantee the victims’ rights to the truth, justice, and remedy; states have revealed little about the assassinations and have not issued arrest warrants. Where there have been arrests and prosecutions, available information reveals a state policy of eliminating perceived enemies. 

Documentation, evidence, and traces obtained through investigations conducted by local police and judicial authorities confirm, however, the theory of state committed crimes. In certain cases, these investigations have resulted in the expulsion (The Netherlands, 2018) or arrest (Brussels, 2020; Turkey, 2021) of Iranian diplomats. In limited cases outside Iran, the perpetrators of these murders have been arrested and put on trial (Paris 1980 and 1991) and the evidence presented, revealed the defendants’ connection to Iran’s government institutions, and an arrest warrant (the Mikonos Trial in Germany) has been issued for Iran’s then-Minister of Information, Ali Fallahian and the Deputy Minister of Telecommunications, Hossein Sheikh Attar.

The manner in which these killings were organized and implemented in Iran and abroad, is indicative of a single pattern which, according to Roland Chatelin, the Swiss prosecutor, contains common parameters and detailed planning. It can be ascertained from the similarities between these murders in different countries that the Iranian government is the principal entity who ordered the implementation of these crimes. (2). In 1997, the Berlin Criminal Court, in charge of hearing the case of the shooting of Kurdish dissidents in a Berlin restaurant, officially announced that the Islamic Republic of Iran’s highest-ranking officials had issued the order to carry out the killings. According to the indictment, the decision to commit the murders was made in a committee called the “Special Operations Committee” composed of the President, the Minister of Information and Security (VAVAK), the Minister of Foreign Affairs, representatives of the various security organs and other organizations, and finally, the Leader of the Revolution. 

Iranian authorities have not officially accepted responsibility for these murders and have even attributed their commission to internal strife in opposition groups. Nevertheless, since the very inception of the Islamic Republic regime, the Islamic Republic officials have justified these crimes from an ideological and legal standpoint. In the spring of 1979, Sadeq Khalkhali, the first Chief Shari’a Judge of the Islamic Revolutionary Courts, officially announced the regime’s decision to implement extrajudicial executions, and justified the decision: “ … These people have been sentenced to death; from the Iranian people’s perspective, if someone wants to assassinate these individuals abroad, in any country, no government has any right to bring the perpetrator to trial as a terrorist, because such a person is the implementing agent of the sentence issued by the Islamic Revolutionary Court. Therefore, they are Mahduroddam (“one whose blood may be spilled, whose life can be taken, without the perpetrator incurring any punishment”) and their sentence is death regardless of where they are [and where you find them].” 

More than 10 years after these proclamations, in a speech about the security forces’ success, Ali Fallahian, the regime’s Minister of Information stated the following regarding the elimination of members of the opposition: “ … We have had success in inflicting damage to many of these little groups outside the country and on our borders” (Speech broadcast on the state-run Iranian Radio and Television on August 31, 1992, quoted from Asr Iran, August 17, 2006).

Extrajudicial killings have rarely been pursued legally in Iran. The few murders that were followed up on in 1998 , which came to be known as “the Serial (Chain) Murders(3),” have brought to light the involvement and responsibility of the country’s Information officials. Several Ministry of Information agents who were defendants in the Serial Murders case, confirmed the existence of a long term government policy of extrajudicial killings and emphasized that there was planning on an annual basis to carry out these executions, for which a religious decree was issued. There was a budget allocated and there were objectives set, and those who participated in the murders were commended. In a lecture given at [the city of] Hamedan’s Bu Ali University in 1996, Sa’eed Emami, Ministry of Information Deputy Minister for Security Affairs and one of the principal defendants in the Serial Murders case – who was later said by Iranian officials to have committed suicide while in detention – had stressed that the activities of Iran’s security forces were not confined to the country’s borders: “ … We have set the security perimeter within the confines of our borders. [However,] if we see threats infiltrating inside the country from abroad, we will enlarge the perimeter.”

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1) Among the first known murders that occurred a week after the February 1979 Revolution was that of Mr. Parviz (Arastu) Sayyah Sina, the bishop of a church in the city of Shiraz. The assassination of Mr. Shahriar Shafiq, an Imperial Navy officer, in December 1979 in Paris is among the first murders committed by the Islamic Republic of Iran outside the country. ​​These killings continued in the following years inside and outside the country and in various forms.
2) Investigations into the murder of well-known personalities in France, Germany and Switzerland have yielded evidence and documentation showing that the officials and employees of the government of the Islamic Republic of Iran acted as accomplices and principals [in the killings]. In France, the Islamic Republic’s Deputy Minister of Post and Telegraph was sentenced in absentia to life imprisonment for the murder of former Prime Minister Shapur Bakhtiar and his assistant, Sorush Katibeh. In Germany (Berlin), the Islamic Republic’s security agents and agents of the Lebanese Hezbollah were sentenced to life imprisonment for the murder of four Kurdish opposition leaders. In connection with the latter case, German Judicial authorities issued an international arrest warrant for Ali Fallahian, the then-Minister of Information. 
3) A few days before Mr. Mokhtari’s murder, Dariush Foruhar and his wife, Parvaneh Eskandari, leaders of the People of Iran Party, had been killed in a most heinous manner in their own home. After Mr. Mokhtari’s body was found, the body of Mohammad Ja’far Puyandeh, another well-known literary figure, was discovered in a village near the city of Karaj. These four individuals’ cases was named the “Serial Murders”.
Human rights violations

Based on the available information, the following human rights may have been violated in this case:

  • The right to liberty and security of the person. The right not to be subjected to arbitrary arrest and detention.

Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR), Article 3; International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR), Article 9.1.

  • The right not to be punished for any crime on account of any act or omission which did not constitute a criminal offence, under national or international law, at the time it was committed. 

UDHR, Article 11.2; ICCPR, Article 15, Article 6.2. 

  • The right not to be subjected to arbitrary or unlawful interference with his privacy, family, home or correspondence, nor to unlawful attacks on his honor and reputation. 

UDHR, Article 12, ICCPR, Article 17.1. 

  • The right to freedom of thought, conscience, and religion, including the right to change and manifest one’s religion or belief.

UDHR, Article 18; ICCPR, Article 18.1, ICCPR, Article 18.2; Declaration on the Elimination of All Forms of Intolerance and of Discrimination Based on Religion or Belief, Article 1 and Article 6.

In its general comment 22 (48) of 20 July 1993, the United Nation’s Human Rights Committee observed that the freedom to "have or to adopt" a religion or belief necessarily entailed the freedom to choose a religion or belief, including the right to replace one’s current religion or belief with another or to adopt atheistic views, as well as the right to retain one’s religion or belief. Article 18, paragraph 2, of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights bars coercion that would impair the right to have or adopt a religion or belief, including the use of threat of physical force or penal sanctions to compel believers or non-believers to adhere to religious beliefs and congregations, to recant their religion or belief or to convert.

  • The right to freedom of opinion and expression, including the right to hold opinions without interference and to seek, receive and impart information and ideas.

UDHR, Article 19; ICCPR, Article 19.1 and ICCPR, Article 19.2.

  • The right to freedom of peaceful assembly. 

UDHR, Article 20; ICCPR, Article 21.

  • The right to freedom of association with others, including the right to form and join trade unions for the protection of one’s interests.

UDHR, Article 20; ICCPR, Article 22.1.

  • The right, as a member of a religious or ethnic minority, to enjoy one’s own culture or to profess and practice one’s own religion. 

UDHR, Article 18; ICCPR, Article 27.

  • The right to equality before the law and the right to equal protection of the law. 

UDHR, Article 7; ICCPR, Article 26.

The right to due process

  • The right to be presumed innocent until found guilty by a competent and impartial tribunal in accordance with law.

ICCPR, Article 14.1 and Article 14.2.

Capital punishment

  • The inherent right to life, of which no one shall be arbitrarily deprived.

Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR), Article 3; International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR), Article 6.1; Second Optional Protocol to the ICCPR, aiming at the abolition of the death penalty, Article 1.1, Article 1.2.

  • The right not to be subjected to cruel, inhuman or degrading punishment.

ICCPR, Article 7; Convention Against Torture and Other Cruel Inhuman or Degrading Treatment and Punishment, Article 1 and Article 2.

About this Case

Correct/ Complete This Entry

He was a sharp, straightforward, decisive, fearless, and social commander within the Democratic Party of Iranian Kurdistan (PDKI), who was tragically assassinated in Turkey.

Information regarding the extrajudicial execution of Mr. Mohammad Qaderi, son of Ameneh and Mohammad Amin, was obtained through separate interviews conducted by the Abdorrahman Boroumand Center. These interviews were conducted with three individuals: a close relative of Mr. Qaderi (November 18 and December 19, 2021), a friend and fellow party comrade (November 15, 2021), and his roommate at the time of his death (December 7, 2021). Additional information was gathered from the book *Who Killed Uğur Mumcu* (by Adnan Güler, 2011), an Amnesty International report (April/May 1993), the Shahid website affiliated with the Democratic Party of Iranian Kurdistan, and the archives of Brigham Young University* in the U.S. (2013).

Mohammad Qaderi was born in 1962 in the Kurdish village of Sarukani, part of the Piranshahr district of West Azerbaijan province. He had three brothers, one of whom became a Peshmerga member of the Democratic Party of Iranian Kurdistan and was killed during the Kurdish struggle. Mohammad Qaderi's education reached only the third year of middle school (ABC interview, November 15, 2021).

After the 1979 revolution, Mr. Qaderi became a member of the Komala Party for less than a year. He then joined the Democratic Party of Iranian Kurdistan (PDKI) as a Peshmerga and served as a commander for PDKI forces in the regions of Dimdim, Naqadeh, Arbabah, Baneh, and Afshin. After the split within the PDKI in 1988, he joined the newly formed faction known as the "Democratic Party of Iranian Kurdistan - Revolutionary Leadership" in early April 1988. (ABC Interview, December 19, 2021)

According to one of his party comrades, the Iranian government was well aware of Mr. Qaderi's involvement in various military operations in Kurdistan and sought to eliminate him. Iranian military and security forces repeatedly entered his father's home at night to pressure Mr. Qaderi, destroying household property and physically assaulting and insulting family members. The source also mentioned that the Piranshahr Intelligence Office detained one of Mr. Qaderi's brothers, Bayazid Qaderi, once in 1984 and again in June 1986 in an attempt to force Mohammad Qaderi to surrender. Two days after his arrest, the Piranshahr Intelligence Office returned Bayazid Qaderi's dead body to his family, with signs of having been shot six times in the head and hands. (ABC Interview with a friend and party comrade, November 15, 2021)

In 1990, Mr. Qaderi left the Democratic Party of Iranian Kurdistan - Revolutionary Leadership to avoid internal party conflicts and to work and financially support his family. He moved to Soran in Iraqi Kurdistan, where he opened a teahouse in the Ali Beg Valley, a recreational area near Rawanduz. In the spring of 1993, due to repeated threats from individuals affiliated with the Iranian government, he sought political asylum in Turkey and moved to the city of Kırşehir. (ABC Interview with a friend and party comrade, November 15, 2021)

Two such threats occurred in 1991. In the first instance, while still a member of the Democratic Party of Iranian Kurdistan, he was arrested by forces from a party influenced by the Iranian government who intended to hand him over to the Iranian authorities. He was released with the help of his friends and the mediation of local leaders (ABC interview with a party comrade, November 15, 2021). A few months later, during winter, someone confessed to him and his friend that the Revolutionary Guards in Piranshahr gave him "some money and a small caliber pistol" to assassinate Mohammad Qaderi. He revealed that he would receive additional money if he completed the assassination. According to Mohammad Qaderi's party comrade, the confession was made because the person knew he was incapable of doing the job. (ABC Interview with a fellow party comrade, November 15, 2021; ABC Interview with a relative, November 19, 2021)

According to Mr. Qaderi's friend, he was "intelligent, straightforward, decisive, fearless, social, and honest.” (ABC Interview with a friend and party comrade, November 15, 2021)

Background on the Formation of the Kurdistan Democratic Party

Following internal conflicts within the Democratic Party of Iranian Kurdistan – established in 1945 with the aim of autonomy for Kurdistan in northwestern Iran – the Party went through a shakeup in 2006 and was split into two separate organizations, the Democratic Party of Iranian Kurdistan and the Kurdistan Democratic Party (PDK). The PDK seeks “the establishment of a Kurdistan Republic within the framework of a federal Iran”. (Charter of the PDK, passed in its 16thCongress in February 2016). This party has not ruled out armed struggle; it has, however, prioritized political struggle and the expression of the people of Kurdistan’s demands through elections and other civil activities within the framework of existing domestic laws in order to achieve their goals. (The official website of the Kurdistan Democratic Party, Kurdistan u Kurd, February 16, 2016).

The PDK has demanded the implementation of, and even negotiation over, Principles 15*** and 19**** of the Constitution of the Islamic Republic that deals with the rights of ethnic and religious minorities. In 2016-17, Party officials met with Iran’s National Security High Council officials in Erbil in Iraqi Kurdistan. On February 15, 2016, in the Concluding Declaration of its 16thCongress, the Party emphasized “rendering the struggle and the activities more robust, both inside and outside the country, and strengthening the nationalist discourse as well as the spirit of unity and solidarity in Iranian Kurdistan in all areas and contexts” through “utilization of all means and methods of struggle for the purpose of universalizing the nationalist discourse in Iranian Kurdistan, relying on unity and solidarity”. (Boroumand Center interview, February 4, 2021; Giarang, January 3, 2019; Deutsche Welle, July 10, 2019; the official website of the Kurdistan Democratic Party, Kurdistan u Kurd, February 16, 2016).

Background of Extrajudicial Killings by the Islamic Republic of Iran

The Islamic Republic of Iran has a long history of politically motivated violence in Iran and around the world. Since the 1979 Revolution, Islamic Republic operatives inside and outside the country have engaged in kidnapping, disappearing, and killing a large number of individuals whose activities they deemed undesirable. The actual number of the victims of extrajudicial killings inside Iran is not clear; however, these murders began in February 1979 and have continued since then, both inside and outside Iran. The Abdorrahman Boroumand Center has so far identified over 540 killings outside Iran attributed to the Islamic Republic of Iran.

Dissidents have been assassinated by the agents of the Islamic Republic outside Iran in countries such as the Philippines, Indonesia, Japan, India, and Pakistan in Asia; Dubai, Iraq, and Turkey in the Middle East; Cyprus, France, Italy, Austria, Switzerland, Germany, Norway, Sweden, and Great Britain in Europe; and the United States across the Atlantic Ocean. In most cases, there has not been much published, and local authorities have not issued arrest warrants. But documentation, evidence, and traces obtained through investigations conducted by local police and judicial authorities confirm the theory of state committed crimes. In some instances, these investigations have resulted in the expulsion or arrest of Iranian diplomats. In a few cases outside Iran, the perpetrators of these murders have been arrested and put on trial. The evidence presented revealed the defendants’ connection to Iran’s government institutions, and an arrest warrant has been issued for Iran’s Minister of Information.

The manner in which these killings were organized and implemented in Iran and abroad is indicative of a single pattern which, according to Roland Chatelin, the Swiss prosecutor, contains common parameters and detailed planning. It can be ascertained from the similarities between these murders in different countries that the Iranian government is the principal entity that ordered the implementation of these crimes. Iranian authorities have not officially accepted responsibility for these murders and have even attributed their commission to internal strife in opposition groups. Nevertheless, since the very inception of the Islamic Republic regime, the Islamic Republic officials have justified these crimes from an ideological and legal standpoint. In the spring of 1979, Sadeq Khalkhali, the first Chief Shari’a Judge of the Islamic Revolutionary Courts, officially announced the regime’s decision to implement extrajudicial executions and justified the decision: “ … These people have been sentenced to death; from the Iranian people’s perspective, if someone wants to assassinate these individuals abroad, in any country, no government has any right to bring the perpetrator to trial as a terrorist, because such a person is the implementing agent of the sentence issued by the Islamic Revolutionary Court. Therefore, they are Mahduroddam and their sentence is death regardless of where they are.” More than 10 years after these proclamations, in a speech about the security forces’ success, Ali Fallahian, the regime’s Minister of Information, stated the following regarding the elimination of members of the opposition: “ … We have had success in inflicting damage to many of these little groups outside the country and on our borders.”

At the same time, various political, judicial, and security officials of the Islamic Republic of Iran have, at different times and occasions, confirmed the existence of a long-term government policy for these extrajudicial killings and in some cases their implementation. 

Read more about the background of extrajudicial killings in the Islamic Republic of Iran by clicking on the left-hand highlight with the same title.

Mr. Mohammad Qaderi’s Extrajudicial execution 

According to available information, Mr. Mohammad Qaderi was abducted on August 13, 1993, in, Turkey (Interview with Mr. Qaderi's roommate, December 7, 2021), and his body was found two weeks later, on August 25, 1993, in the same city (Book: “Who Killed Uğur Mumcu”, 2011; Amnesty International Report, April/May 1993). According to Mr. Qaderi's friend, his body was found by the family of a Turkish gardener (ABC interview with Mr. Qaderi's roommate, December 7, 2021). 

Mr. Qaderi's friend and roommate in Turkey, who was present at the time of his abduction, states that they were heading to a friend's house in central Kırşehir when he noticed a blue car with Ankara license plates following them. He informed Mohammad of this, but he said, "You're being unnecessarily scared." He then described that around 10 p.m., while they were at their friend's house, someone knocked on the door and said they needed to talk to Mohammad Qaderi. When they opened the door, they saw the same blue car with two people in the front seats and two in the back. Two tall, strong men, aged between 35 and 40, dressed in suits and ties, got out of the car. They identified themselves as agents from MIT (the Turkish National Intelligence Organization) and said that Mohammad should go with them to the MIT office to answer some questions. Mr. Qaderi's roommate informed them that Mohammad was unable to speak Turkish proficiently and that he should accompany him. However, they asserted that they had a translator. The witness stated, "We subsequently discerned the situation. Mohammad sought to divert their attention in order to escape. He turned and inquired about his cigarettes. The individuals responded in Persian that they had cigarettes, grabbed him, and put him in the blue car." Afterward, Mr. Qaderi's friends went to the MIT office in Kırşehir to follow up on the matter. When they explained the situation, the MIT police told them, " There was never an MIT official sent on such a mission. (ABC Interview with Mr. Qaderi's roommate, December 7, 2021)

A few days after the body was found, the Kırşehir Security and Intelligence Police took Mr. Qaderi's roommate to the morgue for identification. Regarding his observations of Mr. Qaderi's condition, he said: "They gave me gloves and told me to look at the body in the plastic bag... His body was very swollen. The body smelled terrible and no one dared approach it. Because I am a survivor of chemical warfare and cannot smell well - only my eyes get wet - I was able to get close to the body. I looked into his eyes. Mohammad was short and slight, but his body had become large due to severe swelling. His head had been burned. His testicles were swollen and bruised. His left ear was cut off. He had a mustache, but nothing was left of it. He had been brutally tortured." He said he was able to identify Mohammad Qaderi by the "blue underwear he was wearing and the house keys that were still around his waist. (ABC Interview with Mr. Qaderi's Roommate, December 7, 2021)

Due to the severe torture and the bad smell of the body, no one wanted to approach it. The Turkish police forced Mr. Qaderi's friend to wash the body and wrap it in a white cloth by providing him with gloves, soap, and a white cloth. He added: "Together with some officers, we took the body to Kırşehir cemetery and buried it in an unknown place. I asked the officers to put a sign on the grave so that his family could later find out where he was buried, but they ignored my request". (Interview with Mr. Qaderi's roommate, December 7, 2021)

Mr. Qaderi's family learned of his death through a news article in an Iranian newspaper titled "Two Anti-Revolutionaries Killed in Turkey. (Interview with a relative, November 19, 2021)

Iranian Officials’ Reaction

After Mr. Qaderi's assassination, Iranian intelligence officials raided his parents' home in Piranshahr. They took several of Mohammad's photo albums and Kurdish clothes that his mother had kept as mementos, and they prohibited the family from holding a memorial ceremony. In addition, during a 48-hour detention of one of Mr. Qaderi's relatives, interrogators pressured him to provide information about Qaderi's murder so that they could make arrests. When the detainee referred to Mr. Qaderi as a martyr, he was physically assaulted. (Interview with a relative, November 19, 2021)

Turkish Officials’ Reaction

The day after Mohammad Qaderi's abduction, Turkish intelligence and security police transferred Mr. Qaderi's roommate to the city of İzmir, where he was interrogated extensively. During this time, he was threatened with deportation to Iran and held in solitary confinement for 10 days. Turkish security agents showed him two CCTV videos to identify the perpetrators of the kidnapping. One video showed the blue car involved, and the other showed footage of the area around the Iranian Embassy in Ankara where several people were seen loitering, including two who were identified as the same people who had taken Mohammad Qaderi. (Interview with Mr. Qaderi's roommate, December 7, 2021) 

In the summer of 2000, Turkey's Chief Public Prosecutor indicted 24 individuals from extremist Islamic groups for their involvement in 22 terrorist operations against Turkish and Iranian citizens in Turkey. According to the July 2000 indictment against the Tohid-Salam and Quds Corps groups in Turkey, Iranian intelligence officials were directly responsible for the murder and assassination of several opponents of the Iranian government in Turkey, including Mr. Qaderi. (Book: *Who Killed Ugur Mumcu?*, 2011)

The Kurdistan Democratic Party - Revolutionary Leaderships’ Reaction

There is no information available regarding the reaction of The Kurdistan Democratic Party - Revolutionary Leadership.

Familys’ Reaction

There is no information available on the family's reaction or follow-up to their son's murder.

Impacts on Family

According to a relative, after Mohammad Qaderi's murder, both of his parents got cancer and "died with grief and regret. The whole family withered away and never returned to a normal life, nor will they ever. (Interview with a relative, November 19, 2021)

A friend and roommate of Mr. Qaderi, who witnessed his abduction and later buried him, shared the impact of the assassination and his burial in an interview with the Boroumand Center. He said: "When I arrived in Europe after Mr. Qaderi's murder, I was afraid to go outside for a month. Even after all these years, I still feel fear. I was very scared at that time. Now, I am still anxious and sometimes yell at my family. All of this is a result of his assassination." (Interview with Mr. Qaderi's roommate, November 27, 2021)

Another friend and party comrade of Mr. Qaderi described the impact of his assassination: "It had a profoundly negative effect on our mental and emotional well-being. He was like a brother to us. We shared everything and were very close. His death was a significant blow for me. We were very close, slept back to back, and endured all hardships together. My children will never forget this. My son was 16 at the time of Mr. Qaderi's murder, and the younger ones, who loved him dearly, as well as my wife, will never forget him. He will always have a place in my heart. (Interview with a relative, November 19, 2021)

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* Champion, Brian and Crowther, Lee, "Appendix 3: An Interlinear Comparison of Six Chronologies Documenting Allegedly Iran-Sponsored Extraterritorial Attempted Killings, 1979-1996" (2013). Faculty Publications. 1572.
** Principle 15 of the Constitution of the Islamic Republic of Iran: “The official language and script of Iran, the lingua franca of its people, is Persian. Official documents, correspondence, and texts, as well as text-books, must be in this language and script. However, the use of regional and tribal languages in the press and mass media, as well as for teaching of their literature in schools, is allowed in addition to Persian.”
*** Principle 19 of the Constitution of the Islamic Republic of Iran:” All people of Iran, whatever the ethnic group or tribe to which they belong, enjoy equal rights; and color, race, language, and the like, do not bestow any privilege.”

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