Rights groups seek U.N. probe of Iran rape charges

          
          Rights coups seek U.N. probe of Iran rape charges Reuters.com http://www.reuters.com /arfic lePrint?artic leld=USTRE58K312009092 1
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          Rights groups seek U.N. probe of Iran rape
          charges
          Mon Sep 21, 2009 7:19pm EDT
          By Joshua Schneyer
          NEW YORK (Reuters) - Human rights groups urged the U.N. General
          Assembly to appoint a special envoy to investigate abuses in Iran, alleging
          detainees held after disputed elections there have been raped and tortured.
          Iran has called the allegations baseless.
          Human Rights Watch and the International Campaign for Human Rights in
          Iran on Monday said about 400 prisoners remained in custody for their
          suspected involvement in election protests following the June 12 vote in
          which President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad was re-elected.
          The opposition says the poll was rigged.
          As many as 72 Iranians have been killed by government forces since the
          election, and several have been tortured and sexually abused, the groups
          alleged in a news conference near United Nations headquarters.
          “Member states of the United Nations should use (Ahmadinejad's) upcoming
          visit to the U.N. General Assembly to address Iran's Human rights crisis,”
          the groups said in a statement.
          Ahmadinejad was due to address the U.N. General Assembly on
          Wednesday, with several groups preparing to protest his presence at U.N.
          headquarters in New York.
          Ebrahim Sharifi, a 24 year-old computer science student from Tehran, said
          he was among the prisoners questioned, beaten and raped by Iranian
          interrogators during a harrowing week of detention in late June.
          “He tied my hands to a handcuff that was connected to the wall, tied my
          feet, and pulled down my underwear,” Sharifi said of his interrogator,
          speaking to reporters by phone. “He then sexually assaulted me.”
          Sharifi spoke from Turkey, where he fled last month after he said Iranian
          intelligence officials threatened to kill his family.
          The alleged sexual abuse of detainees has become an incendiary subject in
          highly religious Iran. Defeated presidential candidate Mehdi Karoubi is
          among opposition members who have raised allegations that political
          detainees are being abused.
          Parliamentary Speaker Ali Larijani has received and dismissed at least 100
          reports of sexual abuse carried out on political detainees, said Hadi
          Ghaemi, a coordinator for the International Campaign for Human Rights in
          Iran.
          (Editing by Daniel Trotta and Cynthia Osterman)
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