Will Iran's Human-Rights Failures Bring Down Its Reformer President?

Farhad Rezaei

Politics, Middle East

How it could affect Iran’s global reputation—and next year’s election.

Taking power in 2013, President Hassan Rouhani and his team considered the nuclear pact with the West, referred to in Persian by the acronym Barjam, as a first step in making a fundamental reorientation in Iran’s foreign policy and to normalize Iran’s relations with the outside world. As I explained in my previous analyses, limiting overt kinetic actions by the IRGC and economic recovery are next in importance to the normalization project.

The fourth dimension of Rouhani's normalization project has been improving the state of human rights. Though it is unlikely to be a total spoiler, the human-rights situation may tarnish the normalization project and make it harder for the custodians and their supporters abroad to maintain credibility.

The poor human-rights record of the Islamic Republic has concerned the international community for decades. Iran has been censured by the United States, the European Union and the United Nations. In 1985, Iran was “the fourth country ever in the history of the United Nations” to be placed on the agenda of the General Assembly because of “the severity and the extent of [its] human rights record.”

Over the years, Iran has been accused of a wide range of violations of minority rights, gender rights, gay rights, religious rights, civil right and political rights. The regime has been notorious for its mistreatment and torture of prisoners, extrajudicial killings, excessive use of capital punishment and harsh sentencing guidelines, even for minors. During the tenure of Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, beginning in 2005, Iran’s human-rights record deteriorated badly. Human Rights Watch reported that executions increased from eighty-six in 2005 to 317 in 2007. There were long and arbitrary detentions of “peaceful activists, journalists, students, and human rights defenders,” often charged with “acting against national security.”