UN Iran Rapporteur ‘not fazed’ by mullahs’ personal attack

                   

The United Nations special investigator on the situation of human rights in Iran is not ‘fazed’ by personal attacks by the officials of the Iranian regime and a senior official's announcement that he is banned from the country.

Dr. Ahmed Shaheed spoke on Monday, a day before presenting his report on situation of human rights in Iran to the General Assembly's human rights committee, where he is expected to speak out against the country's second-highest rate of executions in the world.

Mr. Shaheed has been the target many personal attacks which often include crude insults and defamatory remarks by the highest official of the Iranian regime.

Shaheed, a Muslim from the Maldives, has not been welcomed by the Iranian regime. Earlier on Monday, senior judicial official Mohammad Javad Larijani in Tehran called him a "media actor," accusing him of political motivated reports, and announced that he was banned.

Shaheed said he was not surprised. He said he's never been allowed into Iran and has been banned every year since he was appointed in June 2011. He pointed out that technically Iran has a standing invitation to the U.N.'s special rapporteur, though one hasn't been allowed in since 2005.

"The allegation I take sides is totally unwarranted," he said.

In April he wrote in an article: “The attacks against me and other UN officials pale in comparison to those often reported by Iranians who exercise their fundamental rights to free expression, belief, assembly, and association.”

“When people ask me how I feel when officials attack me or the Secretary-General, I can only respond: I am far from a victim. The real victims of these personal attacks are those that live in fear of airing their beliefs, those whose grievances continue to be ignored, and those who continue wait in silence for remedy.”

Ahmed Shaheed also told reporters on Monday he was "shocked" by the execution Saturday of Reyhaneh Jabbari, a woman convicted of murdering a man she said was trying to rape her. He said he had repeatedly raised concerns about the fairness of her trial.

Shaheed worried, though, that Iran would use the nuclear issue as a "positive front" while allowing human rights to become a "backwater."