ACTION ALERT

Fax Transmission

Attention : Hon'ble Mr. LK Advani, The Home Minister of India
Country/State : New Delhi
Fax number : 3015750; 3017763
From : Ravi Nair, SAHRDC, New Delhi, India
Subject : Request to Stop Deportation
Date : 13 February 2001
Page/s : 1

Dear Minister,

I am writing to you to seek the urgent assistance of the Union Home Ministry on a most immediate matter. According to information received by the South Asia Human Rights Documentation Centre (SAHRDC), two Iranian refugees Mr. Abbas Rezai and Mr. Ghafor Zareen are to be refouled or forcibly sent back to Iran by the Indian Government today.

According to information sent to SAHRDC, both the Iranian refugees are members of the Workers' Party in Iran. This is a left wing party that is illegal in Iran. According to information available with SAHRDC both refugees were detained on 6 February 2001 in the United Arab Emirates (UAE) and deported to India.

Since their deportation to Mumbai in India, they have been held in the transit area under the custody of the Mumbai police. It is certain that the Iranian refugees will face persecution, imprisonment and possibly worse in Iran on their return.

South Asia Human Rights Documentation Centre (SAHRDC) has been informed that the local police in Mumbai have severely beaten the detained Iranian refugees and even attempted to drug them into submission in their attempts to forcibly deport them. It is learnt that they are in such a bad shape that in another earlier attempt to deport them on an earlier flight, the pilot refused to take off with them on board after seeing their deplorable condition. It is learnt that they will be put on an Air India flight later today to be deported to Iran.

South Asia Human Rights Documentation Centre requests the Home Ministry to immediately intervene with the concerned departments in the Home Ministries both at the Union level in Delhi and at the State level in Mumbai to stop the deportation immediately.

It is learnt that they are being held in the transit area of the Mumbai Airport.

Ghafor Zareen, born in 1973 in Sanadaj, Iran was arrested in 1995 when returning from Iraqi Kurdistan, and imprisoned for one month. He was released upon signing a guarantee that he would not continue his political activities. At the end of 1999, he returned to Iraqi Kurdistan and continued his overt opposition activities for the Workers' Party of Iran (WPI), which included distribution of the WPI's publications, participation in the WPI's partisan forces, guarding the WPI's leadership.

Abbas Rezai was born in 1976 in Kermanshah and has been a member of the Workers' Party of Iran (WPI) since 1996. His opposition activities resulted in his being arrested a number of times. In the last instance, he managed to escape. He then fled to Iraqi Kurdistan and joined the WPI's partisan forces. He was involved in a mission to Iran with Majid Husseini, a central committee member of the WPI last year.

I shall be grateful if you could have immediate action taken to stop the deportation. The refugees should be allowed to meet with the office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights in New Delhi to ascertain their asylum status.

I shall be grateful if you could request your office to keep me informed about action taken in the matter.

With respectful regards,

Yours sincerely

Ravi Nair
Executive Director

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