-
EXECUTED IN IRAN
• Penásqui.to's rnair'rno 'urnS kin.
• By Joe Hughes
Tribune Staff Writer
A Rancho Penasquitos man whose
cousin was among 16 persons of the
• Bahai faith executed in Iran over the
past five days says he had warning
that his relative feared for his life.
“I knew something like this might
happen, but it came as such a shock,
hearing it so suddenly,” said Afnan
Hâssan, 60, who three years ago fled
from Iran to San Diego with his wife
•and two daughters
Hassan's cousin, Dr. Bahram
Afnan, 48, a cardiologist, was hanged
in a Tehran prison Thursday along,
with five other men. Ten women, in-
cluding four teenage girls, were
hanged yesterday, a spokesman for
the Bahai. faith said.
‘ iiad been in prison eight
months,” a grieving Hassan said yes-
terday as' he joined dozens of other
shocked Bahais at their Linda Vista
temple.
“We knew his sentence. was death,
but we kept hoping for an appeal to
his conviction. But the Iranian gov-
ernment wanted him' to recant his
faith' and convert to Islam; he'
refused.”
At least 150 Bahais remain impris-..
oned in Iran and 141 have been exe-
cuted since AyatoIla1 Ruhollah Kho-.
meini came to power in 1979 after
- the fall of the late Shah Mohammed
Reza Pahlavi.
The Bahais say the Moslem funda-
mentalists governing Iran are trying
to crush their religion by arresting
and executing many of its prominent
members. The Bahai faith,. regarded
as heretical by Islam, was establish-
ed.a century ago in Iran, then Persia.
Its principles include a belief in uni-
versal education, equality of the
sexes, world unity and nonparticipa-'
tion in partisan politics.
“My cousin had lived in fear before
he was arrested,” Hassan said. “The
government had seized all his per-'
_sonal belongings — his house car,
business, money, everything. He had
to suffer. through long interrogations,
pressure and torture.”
Dr. Dwight' Allen, an official with
the National Bahai. organization who
was in San Diego yesterday,' said
‘Hassan's cousin and others impris-
oned there had been forced to go
through four “conversion sessions” in.
an attempt to convert them to Islam.
“There it some fear there will be
violence against Bahais in this coun-.
try,” Allen said. “Our hope is to go to
the public and” tell them what is
going on. We want to mobilize public
opinion of the world.”
- ‘ - -
SAN DIEGO, CA.
TRIBUNE
D. 131,000
SAIl DIEGO METROPOL AN AREA
JUN 20 1983
I'P000237
AFNAN HASSAN
“I knew it might happen”
r
DR. DWIGHT ALLEN
Mobilizing world opinion
