URGENT ACTION
PUBLIC AI Index: MDE 13/093/2006
17 August 2006
UA 221/06 Incommunicado detention / fear of torture/ possible prisoner
of conscience
IRAN Mehdi Babaei Ajabshir
(known as Oxtay) (m), aged 31, activist
Mehdi Babaei Ajabshir
(known as Oxtay), a prominent Azerbaijani activist,
was
arrested on 11 July. He is detained incommunicado at an undisclosed location,
believed to be either
facility in
be detained on account of his peaceful activities on behalf of the rights of
the Azeri-Turkish minority, in which case Amnesty International would consider
him a prisoner of conscience.
On 28 June, at 10.30pm, around sixteen police officers from the Ministry of
Intelligence (Etelaat) entered Mehdi Babaei Ajabshir’s house in order
to arrest
him. He was not present at the time. The police searched the house until
12.30am before arresting Mehdi Babaei Ajabshir’s brother Ali. The police
confiscated Turkish-language books, CDs, family’s computer, a poster, and
family photograph albums. They allegedly threatened members of his family that
when they caught Mehdi Babaei Ajabshir
he would be tortured, or even shot. That
night, the Ministry of Intelligence police made repeated telephone calls to the
family's house, demanding that they reveal the
whereabouts of Mehdi Babaei
Ajabshir.
The following day, Ali Babaei Ajabshir
was released, on the condition that he
would convince his brother Mehdi to report to the Tabriz
Ministry of
Intelligence office. However, Mehdi Babaei Ajabshir did not return home. On 11
July, his family was told that he had been seen being arrested in the street by
Ministry of Intelligence officials. His family did not know his whereabouts
until 21 July, when he telephoned them and told them that he is detained in a
detention facility run by the Ministry of Intelligence in
contact with his family since and no access to his lawyer. It is not known
whether he remains detained at the Ministry of Intelligence detention facility,
or whether he has been transferred to
BACKGROUND INFORMATION
Mehdi Babaei Ajabshir is an
activist from the Azeri-Turkish minority community.
The largest ethnic minority in
number between 25-30 percent of the total population and is found mainly in the
north-west. Activists who promote Azeri Turkish cultural identity are viewed
with suspicion by the Iranian authorities, who often charge them with vaguely
worded offences as ‘’promoting pan-Turkism’’.
In May 2006, massive demonstrations took place in towns and cities in
northwestern
protest at a cartoon published on 12 May by the state-owned daily newspaper
following the demonstrations (see UA 151/06, MDE 13/055/2006, 26 May 2006, and
UA 163/06, MDE 13/063/2006, 8 June 2006). Some of those detained have allegedly
been tortured, with some requiring hospital treatment. Publication of the
newspaper was suspended on 23 May and the editor-in-chief and the cartoonist
were arrested. Azeri sources have claimed that dozens were killed and hundreds
injured by the security forces. The security forces have generally denied that
anyone was killed, although on 29 May a police official acknowledged that four
people had been killed and 43 injured in the town of