Petrelis Files

State Dept Claims it Lacks Facts on Iran's Hangings

Odd that Henry T. Wooster, the State Department's analyst who keeps tabs on Iran would tell the Dallas Voice that they don't have any facts about Iran's public hanging of two gays teens on July 19.

In my phone conversations with Wooster he certainly was aware of some of the facts, and he told me about the Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty report on the hangings, so why he now claims to lack facts puzzles me.

I have sent Wooster all of the news clippings I've found on the web. They were sent to woosterht@state.gov and I will continue to send his articles about the hangings.
^^^


July 28, 2005
The Dallas Voice

Gay activists ask U.S. officials to condemn Iranian executions

State Department issues general statement that fails to mention boys who were hanged because they engaged in sex with each other

By David Webb
Staff Writer

The State Department has issued a statement in response to demands that Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice condemn the reported executions of two gay teenagers in Iran, but it falls short activists’ demands.

The Human Rights Campaign sent a letter to Rice last week urging her to speak out against the hangings in Mashhad, Iran, on July 19. The executions were reported by the Iranian Students News Agency and translated for distribution by the British gay rights group Outrage.

Michael Petrelis, a gay rights activist in San Francisco, who also petitioned Rice for a statement condemning the executions, said Edgar Vasquez, a spokesman for the State Department, read the statement to him over the phone.
The activist said he was disappointed that the statement failed to mention the homosexual aspects of the executions.

Vasquez said in the statement, according to Petrelis, that the State Department is concerned about Iran’s judicial process.

“Defendants are not receiving due process of law, and trials lack procedural safeguards,” said Vasquez in the statement. “As noted in our country’s reports on human rights practices, the judge and prosecutor are the same person, trials are frequently held in closed sessions without access to a lawyer and the right of appeal is not often honored. We call upon the government of Iran to vigorously pursue prison reform, cooperate with international investigations of human rights cases and respect international human rights law and practice.”

Petrelis said he will pressure the State Department for harsher criticism. Iranian law makes homosexual acts punishable by death.

Henry Wooster, a State Department official who monitors Iran, said in a telephone interview that the government cannot issue a more specific statement without more information. Iran claims the teenagers were executed because they raped a 13 year old boy at knifepoint.

“We just don’t have any facts, which puts us in a tough position to come out as a government with a statement,” Wooster said.