2008 Human Rights Report: Iran

Bureau of Democracy, Human Rights, and Labor
2008 Country Reports on Human Rights Practices
February 25, 2009

In November supporters of dissident cleric Ayatollah Mohammad Kazemeini Boroujerdi reported that prison authorities severely beat him and moved him from Evin Prison to an undisclosed location despite appeals for release on medical grounds. Police arrested Boroujerdi at his home in 2006, reportedly after he had come under increased pressure from the government for his belief that religion and the state should be separated. Boroujerdi has been arrested and imprisoned several times since 1992 and claimed he was tortured and threatened with execution. In October authorities also rearrested nine of 70 of his followers who were originally arrested in late 2006 and released in 2007.
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he government carefully monitored the statements and views of all religious leaders, including the country's senior Muslim religious leaders. It restricted the movement of several Muslim religious leaders who had been under house arrest for years and continued to detain at least one dissident cleric, Ayatollah Boroujerdi, during the year. The government pressured all ranking clerics to ensure their teachings conformed to (or at least did not contradict) government policy and positions.
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