Following Iran’s 1979 revolution, Khomeini’s new Islamic state was unstable, and political repression escalated with few limits in sight.
This video series on citizens’ rights in Iran explores through interviews with experts and witnesses the ways in which Iran has protected or breached those rights since it signed the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights in 1968.
This episode looks at Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini’s so-called Eight-Clause Declaration, which he issued on December 15, 1982. Khomeini nominally protected citizens’ rights to privacy and prohibited mistreatment of prisoners, but refused to protect people opposed to his conception of state.
Ardeshir Amir Arjomand, a professor of international law and a former adviser to Iranian opposition leader Mir Hossein Mousavi, says that in the years immediately following Iran’s 1979 revolution, people committed radical acts in the name of Islam, but their deeds often contradicted basic Islamic principles. Khomeini’s declaration was meant to address the situation. Arjomand argues that citizens’ rights cannot be guaranteed through a personal declaration, but only through rule of law and an independent judiciary.
Hasan Yousefi Eshkevari, a member of Iran’s first parliament following the revolution, says the government’s actions should be considered in context. Khomeini issued his Eight-Clause Declaration in the midst of a bloody conflict between the government and a militant group called the People’s Mojahedin. Assadollah Lajevardi, Iran’s chief prosecutor, had planned a door-to-door search to trap the group’s members. At the peak of this conflict, Khomeini issued a famous fatwa declaring that spying for Islam was a religious duty. The public reacted negatively, and Khomeini’s declaration was a political U-turn. Eshkevari argues that, while the declaration was a positive act, it failed to halt executions, torture and other breaches of citizens’ rights.
Farrokh Negahdar, a leftist political activist and former member of the Organization of Iranian People's Fadaian, outlines two views on Khomeini’s reasons for issuing the declaration. The first is that the government was weak and the declaration was a tactical retreat that allowed Khomeini to divide opposition. The second is that revolutionary spirit was still alive in Iran, and the majority Iranians still believed in Khomeini’s leadership, which had been bolstered by the pressures of the Iran-Iraq War and ongoing enmity with the US. Neghadar addresses the consequences of the political debates Khomeini’s declaration inspired.
More episodes in this series:
Part 1: Iran and the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights
Part 2: The First Judiciary Bylaws
Part 3: The First Constitution of the Islamic Republic
Part 5: The Ambiguous Era of Hashemi Rafsanjani