Unfled jQfl$ Department of PubHc Information
Press Sect on
Press Release United Nations, New York
Thirty-sixth General Assembly GA/SHC/2453
Third Committee 29 October 198.1
35th Meeting (PIg)
ThIRD CO MIT E CDNTINtJES D A ON FIVE jtjj AN RIGHTS JFSTIOI S.
Also Hears IntroCuctory Statement on UN Human Rights Activities:
Eight Prooosals on Human Rights Circulated Today
An introductory statement concerning United Nations activities in the
field of human rights was made this afternoon in the Third Committee (Social,
Humanitarian and Cultural) by K. F. Nyamekye, Deputy Director of the Division
manRights,asthecon itteebegaflcOflSiderati0fl0fthi9matt .
Following the last speaker in debate, SAID RAJAEI KHORASANI (Iran), in
exercising the right of reply to a statement made by the United Kingdom
yesterday, called the statement that his Government persecuted the Bahai'i a
fallacious allegation. No single Bahai'i had been sued, put to trial, or
persecuted in Iran. He quoted from an article of the Iranian coastituion that
recognized the right of religious minorities. However, he said, that had
nothing to do with criminals who were accomplices of the Shah and who had
plundered millions of dollars of public revenues and deposited them in foreign
banks.
He said that the allegations of the United Kingdom against Iran were an
excuse to undermine the Iranian revolution. He could remember when the United
Kingdom's economy in the mid—1970s was broken and its garages were full •of
unsold automobiles. The Shah had bought thousands of them. All of a sudden
Her tiajesty's Government survived the crisis. In those days, many politicians
could support their Bahai'i friends easily. But those days were over.
He stated that when the Bahai'i faith was brought to Iran it had a
mission to divide the t '2usljins in the interests of the foreigners in the I 1iddle
East. It had not been strange to see all the Bahai'is around the Shah's
throne; it was not strange to see the United Kingdom speak for them in the
Committee. Why was it that the holy city of the Bahai'i was in occupied
Palestine? he asked. In conclusion, he said that Iran did not persecute any
innocent person upon the recommendation or advice of anybody or any resolution
but on the basis of its Islamic principles.
RICHARD CURTIS FURSLAND (United Kin dorn), in exercise of the right of
reply, reminded the representative of Iran that his delegation's statement
yesterday had been delivered on behalf of the 10 member States of the Europear
Community; he was thus unable to take full credit for it.
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