Foreword

Mahvash Sabet is a member of the Bahá’í community of Iran. She served for the past several years as secretary of an informal council of seven individuals known as the Yaran, who have been responsible for managing the affairs of the Iranian Bahá’í community. She was born in 1953, in the province of Ardestan, but grew up in Tehran and is the mother of two children as well as a university graduate in psychology. Prior to the Revolution, Mahvash was a teacher and subsequently a principal at a number of schools; she was also a trained psychologist and worked closely in this capacity with the National Literacy Committee of Iran. After the establishment of the Islamic Republic, she was expelled from her position and was permanently barred from all teaching posts connected with the State. For the next fifteen years, she was involved in running the Bahá’í Institute for Higher Education, which provided alternative educational opportunities for Bahá’í youth who had been denied access to universities by the State.

On 5 March 2008, Mahvash Sabet was arrested in Mashhad by representatives of the Ministry of Intelligence and National Security. She was later transferred to the security section of the detention centre of Evin in Tehran where the six other members of the Yaran soon joined her, after early morning raids on their homes on 14 May. Like them, she was jailed for two-and-a-half years without a proper hearing and kept both in solitary confinement and with her companion, Fariba Kamalabadi, in the penitentiaries of Evin, Ghohardasht, and Gharchak. She was also subjected, with them, to trials on 12 January, 7 February and 12 April 2010, each of which was aborted because of constitutional irregularities. She was finally convicted and condemned, as they were, to twenty years imprisonment on 12 June 2010. But she has in fact been detained longer than all of them so far.

When I accepted to defend the Bahá’í prisoners, together with Shirin Ebadi, Abdul-Fattah Soltani and Hadi Ismail-Zadih, I had not yet met any members of the Yaran personally. None of them had had access to legal counsel when Tehran’s Security Court announced, on 11 February 2009, that they were accused of spying for Israel and of blasphemous propaganda against the Islamic Republic.

My first encounter with Mahvash Sabet took place on a hot summer’s day that same year, in Evin. After many hours of tedious waiting in a special room set aside for lawyers, I was finally allowed to meet her in the presence of two women guards. She was handcuffed to her companion Fariba, and although they said nothing themselves, it was obvious from the colour of their skin that the Bahá’í prisoners had been deprived of fresh air and daylight for a long time; their entire beings seemed thirsty for the energizing heat and light of the sun. However, despite all their hardships, their will remained unbroken, and they were determined to give up their lives, if necessary, for their beliefs.

Although the Bahá’í community had come into existence in Iran some 168 years before she was even born, the first charge against Mahvash was that she was responsible for the formation of an illegal organization that aimed at the subversion of state security. This was followed by other accusations, including her role as secretary of the Yaran, espionage activities for Israel, the illegal promotion of the Bahá’í Faith and the desire to undermine the Islamic regime. This was the sum total of the charges levelled against her.

A study of the file showed that the grounds on which the Ministry of Intelligence had come to this conclusion were based on nothing more than the prisoners’ adherence to the Bahá’í Faith. However, since the Constitution of the Islamic Republic prohibits inquiry or investigation

into peoples’ beliefs, political motives had to be invented in order to justify the arrest of the Yaran and their indictment on grounds of illegal activity. In fact, the Ministry of Intelligence and the judicial powers were trying to evade the law; they were evoking political motives as a cover-up for their unconstitutional actions. And it was on this basis that these people were arrested and finally condemned to twenty years in jail.

In addition, the prosecution took advantage of a fatwa or religious decree by Ayatullah Makarem Shirazi issued in July 2009 stating that the Bahá’ís were warring against God and spreading corruption on the earth. But beneath all these false accusations there was nothing more than their belief in their Faith and their commitment to running the affairs of the Bahá’í community.

The trial of Mahvash and her co-workers officially began on 12 January 2010, in Branch 28 of the Revolutionary Court in Tehran. The presiding judge, who was dressed in clerical robes, was called Maqiseh. Throughout the proceedings Mahvash was firm and determined, brave and dignified; she seemed fearless of the outcome of the court’s decision against her. Her principal concern was for the Bahá’í community in Iran. She believed that it was not herself but her Faith and those who believed in it that were on trial. No matter how severe the retribution it might incur, she repeatedly stated that the Yaran’s principle raison d’être was to defend the conviction of the Bahá’ís.

But such a defense could only have been possible if the court had respected the law. The lawyers of the Yaran insisted on this outcome and tried to ensure that the provisions of the Constitution were upheld. In fact, this was why the trial was so protracted and the court sessions

indefinitely delayed. The judge wanted to give the impression that he agreed, but also pretended that he had to examine the matter more closely before the prisoners’ detention could be changed to bail. As one session after another was postponed because of illegal court proceedings, we lawyers became increasingly concerned that our clients would no longer be very much in favour of our pressing for compliance with the laws. In the end, after three consecutive days of hearings, on 12 June 2010, all these concerns were swept aside, and the deadlock was broken by a single sentence from Mahvash Sabet.

With great courage and indescribable audacity she stood up on behalf of the Yaran and said, ‘Well, the upshot is that you will finally condemn us. We know that and we are ready for death. But we nevertheless believe that the laws must be upheld and that the Bahá’ís in this country should have the right to defend themselves and their faith.’

When Mahvash Sabet and Fariba Kamalabadi were in Ghohardasht, their fellow prisoners had been prohibited from associating with them. However, the behaviour of these two brave women was such that it gradually attracted the respect of the others. Indeed the staunchness of faith and the unfaltering humanity of Mahvash Sabet is worthy of every praise.