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Iraní
de 17 años de edad es expulsado de Suecia.
17
years old Iranian expelled from Sweden ©
LIOWLB/ENKIDU
17
years old Behroz Kiani is gay. Therefore he risks execution if he is
returned to his home country Iran. Yet, he is not allowed to stay in
Sweden.
He
came to Sweden alone as a refugee in May 2002 when he was only 16
years old and applied for asylum. In an interview with the newspaper
Dagens Nyheter in Stockholm, Behroz tells about his experiences:
I
lived with my family in southern Iran. Fourteen years old, I was
ordered to go to my teacher. He told that he knew I was homosexual and
wanted sex with me. I did not want to, but he forced me. My father hit
me and cut me with a knife when he heard about the incident. He
shouted that I was a disgrace for the family and that I could not live
at home anymore. Thereafter, he went to the teacher and started
fighting with him. The teacher alerted the police, and my father was
arrested.
However,
the problems continued:
The
teacher wanted more sex with me. I was forced to sex several times
before he withdraw the charges against my father so he could get out
of jail. It was blackmailing. Soon the entire school knew that I am
gay and once I was discovered “in action” together with a guy from
another class. We were both reported to the police, and I was
arrested. I feared they would put me in jail, torture me, cut off my
fingers or even my hands, which is what they do with people like me.
It does not matter if you are just a child in Iran. Everyone gets the
same treatment. There is no justice in Iran. People disappear without
procedure. And, if you are gay, you risk being killed – without
procedure.
Fortunately
Behroz Kiani was able to escape:
The
Police did not get me. However, my “bad reputation” spread quickly
around the town and I had nowhere to go. I slept in the streets, I was
hit and raped twice. Unknown men captured me and brought me to a
deserted area outside the town. They threatened me with a knife. Later
I was allowed to live with my father’s brother. He contacted human
smugglers and they helped me escape to Sweden.
According
to Swedish legislation, a foreigner who risks prosecution in his home
country due to sexual orientation has a right to protection in Sweden.
Yet, the Swedish Immigration authorities denied Behroz Kiani
permission to stay in Sweden. The case has many parallels to the story
about the Lesbian woman Sima, also from Iran, who applied asylum in
Norway that was covered by Enkidu last year. It was recommended to
return her to Iran because, despite the fact that she risked
prosecution and severe problems, she would not be arrested if she
stayed in the closet and lived anonymously. Her case is still being
dealt with in the High Court of Oslo. The Swedish authorities use a
similar interpretation of the law. They do not at all question the
fact that it is extremely difficult to be gay in Iran. However, they
also conclude that Behroz might MAINTAIN LIFE in Iran if he is
returned, since they do not possess final evidence indicating that the
Iranian authorities know about his homosexuality. The sources do not
mention what makes the Swedish authorities so certain that the Iranian
authorities are unaware of Behroz’ homosexuality. Perhaps they sent
an e-mail asking if anyone had heard that Behroz is gay, or someone at
the Swedish Embassy in Teheran made a call to someone…
Behroz
Kiani, however, says that the interpretation of the Swedish ministry
of Immigration is not based in the reality:
The
Police in my hometown knows that I am gay and that I have had sex with
other guys. They have interrogated me several times. If I apply for a
passport at the Iranian embassy in Stockholm, the staff will find out
everything about me. I will be searched for all over the country. They
will catch me already when leaving the airplane. I will be put in
prison and disappear.
Homosexuals
are frequently executed in Iran, but it happens in secret, Behroz
tells Dagens Nyheter.
Despite
this, the Swedish authorities do not consider the humanitarian aspect
in this case sufficient to grant Behroz permission to stay. They also
ignore the UN Child Convention, which also should apply in this case
since Behronz Kiani is under 18.
According
to dr. med Anneli Brändström and psychologist Per Höglund at the
University Hospital in Norrland, Behroz Kiani needs psychiatric
treatment since he suffers from post-traumatic stress syndrome,
depression, sleeping problems and nightmares. He has concentration
problems and is suicidal.
Not
even this knowledge is sufficient for the Swedish authorities. In a
couple of weeks Behroz Kiani will be forcefully returned to Iran.
Dagens Nyheter writes that Mona Sahlins, minister of immigration, has
not yet commented the case. Amnesty International Sweden, however
confirms that secret executions of homosexuals occur in Iran. This was
reported by Amnesty International as well as the UNHCR already in the
1990s. Secretary General Carl Söderbergh in AI-Sweden says to Dagens
Nyheter that it therefore outrages him that homosexual Iranians still
can be denied protection in Sweden.
According
to the hodoud-legislation, a man having sexual intercourse with
another man shall be executed. Men having sexual relations without
penetration shall be whipped. Women touching each other’s sexual
organs shall receive one hundred lashes, a punishment often resulting
in death.
However,
Iranian homosexuals applying for asylum in Sweden are regularly denied
to stay. The Swedish Embassy in Teheran has for several years claimed
that the Iranian courts do not anymore use these paragraphs actively,
and that therefore a de facto tolerance towards homosexuality is
prevalent in the country(!). The Ministry of Immigration has accepted
this information from the Embassy. Carl Sönderbergh, however,
underlines that the dark numbers are high regarding executions in
Iran. Amnesty suspects that the authorities also uses other crime
classifications in order to get rid of homosexual citizens.
We
know that people may be executed because of their sexual orientation
in Iran. The Swedish authorities must pay attention to this. We must
regard the fear that these Iranians express as reasonably justified
considering that the paragraph about capital punishment still exists
in the Iranian criminal code. Everything else is unreasonable.
The
Swedish Government decided in 1998 that only homosexual Iranians who
openly have declared their sexual orientation have the right to stay
in Sweden. Closeted Iranians should be returned, a policy, which also
Norway adopted a short time later as another convenient way of further
reducing the number of non-European immigrants. Thereafter, only
individuals who have been able to be interviewed by journalists about
their case (and preferably had their story published in the big
national newspapers. A couple of lines in a local newspaper is not
enough) have had any chance to stay in Sweden, since extremely few
Iranians, if any, ever openly declared their homosexuality in public
in Iran before they left the country in such a way that it can be
documented before the courts in Sweden.
Carl
Söderbergh expresses that it is necessary to change this routine as
it now is practised:
It
is grotesque to force these extremely vulnerable human beings to go to
the newspapers or television in order to get permission to stay in
Sweden. It is unreasonable that only those who dare to expose
themselves in public will be granted asylum, while the others are
rejected. It is not the journalists’ responsibility to decide the
fates of refugees. This is something the authorities should do based
in law and justice.
Enkidu/Dagens Nyheter/Amnesty
Sverige 3-7 Feb 2004*
* [Si
desea información sobre la fuente original favor de solicitarla a ENKIDU].
Los
Martes de Enkidu
[17.06.2003]:
