The Sentinel Project’s research team is constantly seeking to improve the flow of information surrounding our situations of concern (SOC). After all, information is the key to predicting genocide and the more knowledge we can gather about events happening in a given SOC, the more likely that we can predict the escalation of violence and warn the people in harm’s way. Gathering information also comes with a duty to report what is happening, particularly when events indicate that the genocidal process is unfolding.
As part of our effort to regularly disseminate information about our SOCs, we are introducing monthly summaries listing all of the significant events which have happened in a given country. The first of these summaries is for the Iranian Bahá’í SOC in February, a month which saw continued arrests and detention of Bahá’ís and the expulsion of more Bahá’í students from universities. Alarmingly, the Iranian Ministry of Education is now reported to have ordered the country’s public schools to identify and report all Bahá’í students, which may indicate that the exlusion of Bahá’ís will soon be broadened from universities to elementary and high schools as well.
Iqan Shahidi was sentenced last month to more than five years in prison. The charges on which he was convicted include “membership of the illegal association for the right to education,” “propaganda against the regime,” and “membership of the Bahá’í community.”
Read the full summary for more details. All information has been gathered from open sources which are linked in the report.