Brody's Notes... Fleeing Death- Iranian Gays Flee To Turkey Seeking Asylum

Saghi Ghahraman   Photo Courtesy Of Saghi Ghahraman

By Brody Levesque (Bethesda, Maryland) Apr 3 | Noted Persian Poetess Saghi Ghahraman, a 50-year-old lesbian who fled Iran after its 1979 fundamentalist revolution and now lives in Toronto as a Canadian citizen told Washington Post foreign service correspondent Anthony Faiola: 

“The bravery that has come out of the gay community in Iran since the elections has been inspiring, but the government has not taken it lightly, They have come down harshly and violently. They’ve made it more difficult than ever to be gay in Iran."

Ghahraman stressed the importance of people being able to “choose one’s own identity, and one’s own sexual identity” — provocative views given Tehran’s strict policies against homosexuality.

For a special report published in the paper in February, Failola and Washington Post photographer Andrea Bruce journeyed to several cities in Turkey to interview dissident Iranian Gays & Lesbians, thought to be numbering more than 1,000, who have fled Iran since last June’s election of President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad. Living temporarily in Turkey seeking asylum, they await help from the United Nations to place them in the United States, Canada, Western Europe or Australia.

Ghahraman says that in her homeland, Homosexuality is strictly illegal in the Islamic republic and homosexual sex is punishable by death. Turkey, in contrast, has relatively secular attitudes. However there are still problems that remain. Post Correspondent Failola continues:

To avoid a critical mass in any one Turkish city, the refugees are dispersed to two dozen locations. The list does not include more progressive Istanbul, gem of the Bosporus, but rather, smaller metropolises such as Isparta that remain influenced by Islam in the same way Christianity influences the Bible Belt.

Those who arrive in Turkey have joined a growing exodus of the crusading journalists, human rights activists, academics and artists who have long ranked among Iran's chief agents of change. They range from high-profile cases, such as dissident journalist Hasan Sarbakhshian and filmmaker Narges Kalhor, the daughter of a top adviser to President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, to the lesser-known members a nascent movement of gays and lesbians struggling for tolerance.

"You have high achievers in the political fight coming out of Iran, where their influence is going to be much less than if they were still there," said Drewery Dyke, an Iran specialist with Amnesty International.

According to the Post's Failola, Dyke and other rights activists said the dissidents' relative freedom in exile offers them a better perch for their fight than would the inside of an Iranian jail. They are now helping fuel an international network of exiles who send blocked international news reports and details of upcoming protests to allies back home. They also document abuses, including allegations of torture and rape at the hands of security forces, with human rights groups abroad. 

 "You now have people working together to say bring back the promise of a more transparent, open society that was lost when Ahmadinejad came to power," said Hadi Ghaemi, director of the New York-based International Campaign for Human Rights in Iran.

Since Ahmadinejad first came to power in 2005, oppression of gays has intensified, according to human rights groups. Some prominent western activists have strongly critised International LGBT Rights organisations for not being proactive enough on the building crisis in Iran for Lesbians & Gays.

Michael Lucas, head of Lucas Entertainment, a New York City based Gay adult erotica firm, in attendance at the International Gay and Lesbian Human Rights Commission  (IGLHRC) organisation's 20th anniversary celebration, dinner, and awards ceremony held in New York City last month, said in an Op-Ed published in the Advocate:

"What I heard about IGLHRC’s work left me not just unimpressed. It left me deeply disappointed.

I salute IGLHRC for its involvement in Uganda, where international pressure seems to have put a stop to a proposed law that would allow for the execution of gay people in certain circumstances. But all the rest of the talk was about work in countries where it’s actually pretty easy to advocate for LGBT rights and, while sometimes difficult, far from impossible to live as an out gay person: Mexico, Brazil, Jamaica, Belize.

Not one word about the places where the real atrocities against LGBT people take place today — the countries oppressed by Islam: for example, Iran, Saudi Arabia, Iraq (yes, even after the “liberation”), the Palestinian territories."

Lucas additionally commented in his Op-Ed that: 

"IGLHRC has staff assigned to this area, so the organization must know what goes on there, and for all I know, it has useful programs in the region. If it does, the group prefers to keep silent about it.

So why does the region which today is most cruel toward gay and lesbian people get a free pass? Is it politically incorrect to get involved where the need is most dire? Is it once again the word “Islam” that makes criticism and, indeed, humane intervention impossible? Or are we just simply too intimidated by the Islamists and their fatwas to help those of our gay brothers and sisters who are today in most danger?"

Arsham Parsi  Photo By The Globe & Mail

Arsham Parsi, an Iranian Gay activist and founder of Iranian Railroad for Queer Refugees (IRQR) said that Turkey does not accept non-European refugees for permanent resettlement, and processing for asylum in the West could take two years or longer. Most will probably go to the United States or Canada, a smaller number to Western Europe and Australia. Until then, they are burning through savings to cover housing, food and a refugee tax. Turkey does not allow them to work.

Parsi told an interviewer last fall in Canada where he now resides:

"We have been able to form very close relationships with human rights organizations, including the United Nations, the Office of the High Commissioner for Refugees, the new Council for Human Rights, Human Rights Watch, the Commission for International Homosexual Human Rights, and the European Parliament. Furthermore, as an Iranian member of the International Lesbian and Gay Association (ILGA), the IRQO has been able to prevent the deportation of many gay refugees back to Iran, so that they may have the right to live freely. Additionally, IRQO has received considerable attention from the international press. 

Last October, we earned a seat at the second gathering of the new UN Council for Human Rights. It was the first time in history that an organization representing the Iranian queer community presented their concerns at the international level. Also, ILGA is applying for membership in the United Nations Economic and Social Council (ECOSOC) so we can have a consultative voice as an Iranian queer organization and address the concerns of our community."

In the meantime the flow of refugees escaping Ahmadinejad's repressive regime in Tehran continues unabated. The Post's Failola writes:

"Their varied backgrounds underscored the diversity of the anti-government movement. In one corner sat Afshin Darvaresh, 31, a visual artist, who said security forces ransacked his studios in Tehran in June after they found anti-government fliers hidden in his files. He chatted with Hasan Vaziri, 31, a labor leader at a chemical plant in Shiraz, who helped mobilize workers for the protests. Opposite them, Saadat, the woman's rights activist, sat cross-legged on the floor.

 "We all left because we had no choice," she said. "None of us want to be here. Do not underestimate the will of those fighting for freedom and social justice in Iran," she said. "It will not be that easy to defeat us."