U.S. Concerned About Iranian Rights Policies

The United States has called on Iran to respect human rights and to embrace religious and ethnic tolerance.

The State Department singled out the case of an Iranian dissident from the Azeri minority, Abbas Lisani. The department says Lisani was harassed, beaten and imprisoned following peaceful protests.

Spokesman Sean McCormack said the Iranian government had banned the Azeri language in schools, harassed ethnic Azeri activists, and unjustly jailed them, including Lisani, for advocating cultural and linguistic rights.

He said Washington was deeply concerned by the regime's continuing oppression of Iran's ethnic and religious minority groups, including Azeris, Kurds, Baha'i, ethnic Arabs, and others.

The spokesman added that the Iranian regime's repression also affected students, women, labor unions, journalists, and academics.

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