Human Rights a Threadbare Pretext Against Iran

By: Hamid Reza Naghashian

TEHRAN (Iran News) –  The Islamic Republic of Iran since 1979 and its foundation has faced a repeated accusation by the West and it has always been accused of violating the human rights while the Western countries are the real violators of the human rights in the world and even in their own territories.

The Western-backed organizations come to the assistance and rescues of their mentors when they are called, and issue statements against the human rights condition in the Islamic Republic of Iran while they close their own eyes on what is going in the Western countries or in pro-West countries.

Unfortunately the human rights body of the United Nations acts in favor of the Western countries and it usually follows the prescriptions of the West in condemning human rights condition in the anti-world arrogant countries like Iran.

On Saturday a top Iranian human rights official lamented the exploitation of human rights issues by certain countries as a tool to pressure other nations, saying human rights will be the main victim should Western countries insist on applying double standards.

“Unfortunately, some countries use human rights as a tool against others to achieve their foreign policy goals,” Kazem Gharibabadi, the secretary general of Iran’s Human Rights Office, said during a meeting with Wolf Dietrich Heim, the Austrian ambassador to Tehran.

Pointing out that Western countries are not spared when it comes to human rights violations as there are many instances of rights violations in those countries, Gharibabadi added, “If double standards and politicization pervade in the field of human rights, the victim will simply be human rights itself.”

Earlier this month, the Third Committee of the UN General Assembly (UNGA) approved an anti-Iran draft resolution on the situation of human rights in the Islamic Republic of Iran by a vote of 79 in favor to 30 against, with 71 abstentions.

Iran’s delegate called the resolution – sponsored by Canada, the United States, and “the child-killer Israeli regime” – an “insincere political move” that exposes the deliberate hostile policy of incitement to “Iranophobia.”

The main proponents of “racism, occupation, and those behind the abhorrent murder of indigenous peoples have come together to lecture others on human rights,” Zahra Ershadi, deputy permanent representative of Iran to the UN, said before the Third Committee on November 17.

“The West may choose silence over Canada’s horrendous crimes, but history will never forget that in the so-called land of the free, thousands of indigenous children were sexually abused, killed, and dumped in mass graves,” she added.

In his remarks, Gharibabadi also slammed Canada as “one of the major violators of human rights.”

The government of the Islamic Republic of Iran has always reiterated that the instrumental and selective use of human rights and the adoption of a dual approach should be abandoned once and for all, and instead, attention should be paid to human rights mechanisms such as the UPR.

Tehran has always condemned unilateral acts of coercion that violate the principles of the UN Charter, international law, multilateralism and the fundamental norms of international relations.

When it comes to dealing with Iran, Venezuela, Syria, Yemen, Lebanon  or other countries which have problem with the West, the UN body issues a human-right statement against them but this body is inclined to condemn or issue any effective statement against the U.S. and Europe and especially against their cruel sanctions against the countries.

Every day we read some reports in human right violations in the West, the UN human body closes its eyes on them but when it some unrest or incident happens  in some countries like Iran, the body wakes up and reacts. Of course, as usual the Western states are the first who begin criticism and bully against Iran.

The world is suffering from the double standard approach towards human rights and people in the world want a fair and equal approach to the issue of human rights which has turned into a tool in hands of the West to bring down the governments and the nations who do not obey them.

The Islamic Republic of Iran has always supported human rights issue in the country and the world but it is against the double standard approach in this issue which is used as a pretext to increase pressure on the nations and will not bow down to the Western type of human rights principles which disregard human values.