A/HRC/25/61 the minds of authorities. The judge in his case read a statement from the interrogator when he issued his sentencing. He left Iran in July-August 2010. It was one month after he received his first verdict, and had demanded an appeal. In September 2010 he received a call from his mother who said that his appeal was rejected and that he received a two-year prison sentence and lashes. Authorities called his parents and they told them he was away studying in Europe, where he decided to stay. Jaleh Razmi (Tabrizi) Azerbaijani rights activist Ms. Ramzi is the ethnic minorities’ representative and a co-founder of Sudwind. She is a human rights activist from the Azerbaijani minority and from the Ahl-E-Haq (Yarsan) religion. President Rouhani made a lot of pledges to the Azerbaijanis in the election, and as a result they voted for him en masse. For example, he promised to open Azerbaijani cultural rights center, and told them: “You will no longer need to fill Lake Oroumiyeh with your tears; I will fill it with water!” However, since then the situation has gotten worse. He appointed Mr. Ali Younessi as Governor of the Province, and he has been bad for the people. The prisons are still full, and “nothing has changed.” “The Azerbaijanis are a peaceful people; they “do not use violence...” The Yarsan is a religion, just like Baha’is and Dervishes. Until recently, no one spoke about them, and they themselves did not raise their issue. But given the recent self-immolations, she herself, even “even as a secular person,” has decided to speak about it. There are 4 million Yarsan in Iran. Many have been forced to convert to Islam, and indeed, some have. Recently, when one Yarsan man was made to shave his mustache in jail three people Hamedan and Kermanshah self-immolated; one in front of Parliament who died. Mr. Mehdi Ghasemzadi was also recently executed. Regarding the general situation of human rights defenders in Iran, the situation is very difficult. She, for instance, cannot go back to Iran and her family faces pressure. The Azerbaijanis are facing cultural repression; they cannot use their own language, their Turkish names, and their street names are changed in Tabriz and elsewhere. Simi Sabri Azerbaijani rights activist Ms. Sabri has come to look at the question of minorities through the lens of a psychologist, especially the issue of mother tongues. Iran, for academics of her school of thought, is like “a big prison for mother tongues.” The Azerbaijanis are not a violent group; they never have been. But the Government also suppresses their voices, as with other minorities, and censors much of what they have to say in the news. 98