Arc Association for the defense of human rights of the Azerbaijani people in Iran “ArcHR”
Madame Chair,
The majority of migrants are women and children. Women migrants are among those most vulnerable to
human rights violations, as both migrants and as women.
Due to a lack of investment, economic opportunities, and development in the regions of Azerbaijan, they
are forced to migrate or to move to the interior of the country. As a result, women and children are
affected by marginalization, economic poverty, and educational poverty.
Clearly, these forced displacements do not allow families to provide for their economic needs. Linguistic
as well as cultural difficulties must be added to this, as families, not speaking Farsi, are cut off from the
world of work. Thus, instead of going to school, many children work in the street to help their family
survive. In most cases, these children are subjected to sexual attacks and are victims of the pressure
exerted by organized gangs involved in drugs and prostitution.
I note that a majority of these children working in the street do not have national identity cards, because
the government ignores them.
Minority women in Iran have always struggled with systematic discrimination in the application of
legislation because of their ethnicity. They are more and more often victims on a daily basis of violence
induced by this discrimination. These women, subjected to considerable social pressure in a society
where they suffer from a lack of protection under the law and the weight of traditions, I believe that
policies with respect to women will only obtain their objectives if their foundation is based on human
rights and the fight against discrimination.
Article 19 of the Constitution against discrimination has never been applied by the IRI, but it should be
noted that formal equality in reality only relates to certain criteria without mentioning other grounds for
discrimination such as “sex”. It should also be noted that equality between men and women is not
mentioned in the constitution of the IRI.
With regard to what has been said, we recommend to the IRI to demand that
The Iranian state provides economic opportunities in the regions of Azerbaijan;
Article 19 of the Constitution on racial discrimination be implemented
The 2030 Sustainable Development Goals be applied.