Hunger striker's 19th day

On 15th August 2009, I went to meet up with the hunger strikers from the Iranian Liberty Association outside the US Embassy in Grosvenor Square, London. The ongoing protest is largely over the treatment of peaceful protestors in Ashraf City in Iraq. The Ghandi-like protestors (all peaceful and unarmed) have been met with chains, bricks, stones, batons, iron bars and live ammunition from the Iraqi military.

There are a number of reasons these peaceful people appear to have encountered such open hostility. Firstly, and probably the most likely reason is that their leader is an Islamic woman who is secular (believes that the church and the state should be separate).



The Ashraf City culture is one of fairness and equality and a profound belief in human rights. The activities of the Ashraf City residents has been supported by Amnesty Internationational and other human rights groups.


Partly because of the secular nature of the Iranian Liberty Association, some of the people who came to speak today were not Muslims, just human beings who share the Association's hopes for peace, harmony and fairness.

Many of those people present today have lost family members, solely because they spoke out against oppressive regimes. Some had been tortured or killed because their views differed from those in power. There are few members of the Iranian Liberty Association who haven't lost someone close in the fight for justice and equality.

At the foot of a statue of Dwight D Eisenhower outside the Embassy is the plinth below. A statement from the wartime president's opening address that most people would have difficulty in disagreeing with, yet there are so few people around the world who are truly "free".

As I see it, there is an irony here that so often gets overlooked. The citizens in developing contries who yearn for the sort of freedom we taken for granted in the West find that freedom is so often denied to them because of interference from the very countries who boast about democracy.

The fact that the government of this or that democractic country wants their oil or other natural reserves, means that they will collude with and line the pockets of dictators who have something to sell them. In payment, (some) governments of the developed world turn a selective blind eye to the human rights violations of the corrupt governments around the world.

Every government should contain a government health warning. Nothing political is correct.

For more information about the Iranian Liberty Association go to: http://iranliberty.org.uk/