Laurie Ferguson (Werriwa, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

It is very telling that this is not the first occasion on which this matter has come before the federal parliament. In fact, it is one of the string of motions that people on both sides of the parliament have addressed over the 20 years that I have been in this parliament. This stretches to 1979, when the house of Bab was destroyed in Shiraz, and we can trace an incident where the Baha'u'llah's father's residence in Tehran was destroyed. There was the execution of over 200 Baha'is, and as mentioned earlier, the 2008 arrest of the entire leadership.

As announced by the mover, this is a religion that emphasises global solutions. In my old electorate, I attended every year an event on the international Human Rights Day, which was organised by the Holroyd Baha'i community. It was not to propagandise about their own situation; it was to make sure that the world understood these very important principles.

Iran itself campaigns around the world—and quite rightly in some cases—for the Shiah majority in Bahrain, about their lack of rights and their suppression. They speak of the persecution of the Houthi minority in Saudi Arabia. They have understandable fears for the Alawites, if ever the regime in Syria falls, and they have quite rightly raised the underrepresentation of the very significant Shiah population in Lebanese politics. On an international front, they raise the condition and the rights of their religious confederates, some of which are for reasons of international politics often ignored. It is thus ironic that within Iran we see systematic persecution of the Baha'is and ethnic minorities such as Kurds and Azeris, people incarcerated for practising theosophy, women arrested for campaigning for human rights, people jailed for criticising very questionable election results and a whole plethora of other people executed and incarcerated. Of course the Baha'is have been very active around this matter in this country, and that is why, of all the persecuted groups, they are the one that most often comes before this parliament.

We see no real improvement. In late 2013 the United Kingdom's Foreign & Commonwealth Office said Iran 'has not substantially improved its human rights'. It has been the subject of consistent criticism by the UN special rapporteur, Ahmed Shaheed, who late last year spoke of no improvement. It is a situation that has been constantly criticised by the credible international organisation, Human Rights Watch. It has been the subject of a vote in the United Nations in 2013, which expressed deep concerns. We all know how difficult it is to mobilise UN resolutions criticising any country party to the United Nations, so the fact that that was carried 86 to 36 is indicative of how serious problems are there. Most recently, in August 2014 reports found that there were insufficient trial safeguards and inadequate access to legal counsel. Interviewees stated that lawyers refused to take their cases due to the fact that there would be reprisals against them for defending Baha'is and other religious minorities. Despite Iran accepting nine recommendations from the United Nations Human Rights Council, including commitments to uphold freedom of belief and religion and combat incitement, we can say with a great degree of confidence that there is a process of state-instigated discrimination against Baha'is.

As we have seen, there is an inability of Baha'i practitioners to get an education in the country. That is always a crucial need for minority groups in any society, whether they be Jews, Tamils, Palestinians or refugee groups around the world. For these people, education is often the only option, because other areas are cut off. But education is denied to Baha'is.

We have talked about the way in which their leadership has been constantly decimated and the way religious things that matter to them are being constantly destroyed. Iran would be the first country in the world to deplore ISIL's destruction of other religious sites in Iraq or Syria, but they see no inconsistency in destroying and suppressing another religious group. I commend the movers of this motion. I hope it will not be a resolution that will be moved here for the next 20 years. I hope that international pressure and the need for Iran to try and reach some accommodation with the West over nuclear weapons and other facets will increase the possibility of change.

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