THE EVIL MEN DID IN… TABRIZ

By Adepeju Solarin - The Advocacy Project - Jul 27th, 2010

Elnaz Babazadeh was kidnapped, beaten, raped, and murdered earlier this month in Tabriz, an Iranian city that’s an Azerbaijani [Turkish] stronghold. The earliest online news reports show information for July 12. However, it is believed she had been missing about a week before as her parents found her body at a local morgue.

The ugly truth is Elnaz was treated with evil disregard, and the Western media has been largely silent. Elnaz was murdered for wearing her hijab (Islamic headscarf) "inappropriately." My guess is she was wearing it, but it didn’t cover her whole head.

Her murderers—young men of the notorious Basij (a shady law enforcement class)—were released shortly after being arrested. It was supposedly a “misunderstanding.” A misunderstanding is when negotiations fail because both sides see things differently. A misunderstanding is NOT beating, raping, and shooting a young woman, point blank, because she failed to wear her headscarf the proper way.

What makes this all the more painful is the lack of media dissemination in non-Iranian news outlets. Google searches (and other sites) produce little to nothing about this news report. The non-reporting gives credence to the Iranian government and its conspiracy-theory supporters about how the West turns a blind eye to human rights violations, except when it suits them.

It makes little sense. Last year all media outlets, from CNN to Fox News, were saturated with Neda Agha-Soltan’s story—the young woman who was gunned down at a rally. Pain is pain. Thus there will be no comparisons, however, the question is: WHY? Why, after two weeks, is there still no significant news story, except the LA Times Babylon and Beyond entry, which addressed the issue as a sub-point under the Sakineh stoning. True, many human rights violations occur daily, and it is sometimes impossible to report them all. Nevertheless, this one could have been reported too!

Some, like the Southern Azerbaijan National Awakening Movement (SANAM), believe the lack of interest is due to its location, Tabriz, a predominantly non-Persian region and with an offender whose father is a high-ranking Revolutionary Guard member. Little of this sort of crime seems to happen in Tehran for all its “bad hijab” styles. Why?

SANAM’s argument is plausible, considering that ADAPP exists to voice human rights violations happening to Azerbaijanis in Iran. Granted, Elnaz was no political activist—and neither was Neda—and there is no viral video of the atrocious crime in this country. However, it is still a human rights violation of enormous proportions. Why wasn’t this story explored, investigated, and disseminated? True, Iran is a sovereign country (I feel the need to always mention this, as the subject of human rights is prickly for Iran and world leaders), but that does not tie the hands of other nations in discussing such tragic events. It is no wonder there is such back and forth when it comes to discussing human rights on the international stage. Each side calls a bluff because leaders lack integrity.

And the kicker: well, a few days later, news-blog sites Persian2English and the Human Rights Activists News Agency report that Iran’s Interior Minister, Mustafa Mohammed Najjar, ordered a crackdown on “bad hijab.”

This may sound naïve, even foolish, but one must entertain the thought that Ahmadinejad and Supreme Leader Khamenei do not know  Elnaz’s tragic end. They could not because they, too, are  fathers, and fathers, no matter how strict, would never condone such evil–and neither does the Quran. 

Please, if you can, share this news and send it to whoever is in a position to publicize it. Elnaz should not be swept under the rug.

Thank you.

 
Original Link: https://www.advocacynet.org/the-evil-men-did-in-tabriz/