Justice for Iran (JFI) is a London-based non-governmental human rights organization. The stated objective of the organization is to "address and eradicate the practice of human rights abuses and impunity that empowers officials of the Islamic Republic of Iran to perpetrate widespread human rights violations against Iranian citizens, and to hold them accountable for their actions."
Objectives and mission
While traditionally plethora of human rights organizations have concentrated on documenting human rights abuses, lobbying and monitoring human right situations; JFI's distinctive mission is human rights advocacy to promotes accountability and redress. Helping to counsel and empower survivors and the relatives of victims is an essential part of JFI's work. By documenting, researching, awareness raising, advocacy and litigation, JFI, endeavors to serve as a source of analysis and information on the human rights situation in Iran, as well as an active NGO advocate in the international arena.
Activities and projects
JFI's main areas of work include ethnic and religious minorities, LGBTIs, women, and those who are persecuted because of their political beliefs. To achieve its mission, JFI researches, documents, validates cases and uses various media outlets to enhance the situation of human rights. JFI seeks justice through international venues and institutions where local systems of justice and accountability are nonexistent or insufficient.
Litigation for human rights
In 2015, as a third party of interest, JFI intervened in the case of Mohammad Sarafraz and Hamid Reza Emadi two of the Islamic Republic (IRI) officials who had challenged their travel ban and asset freeze case before the European Court of Justice (ECJ). These sanctions were approved in March 2013 by the EU Commission due to their involvement in serious human rights violations. Both parties were found guilty of serious human rights violations by ECJ marking the first time that a European court held an IRI official accountable for their culpability in a torture related case. The court ruled that in their capacity as the authorities of the Islamic Republic of Iran's Broadcasting, IRIB, and its subsidiary Press TV, they were guilty of serious human rights abuses.
JFI presented expert witnesses who testified about the fact-based study of JFI called: Cut, Take Press TV off the Air. As a result, the sanctions against these two human rights violators remained in place.
Additionally, Islamic Republic media mouthpiece, Press TV, has also been taken off the air in several countries. JFI urged satellite companies and governments to take Press TV off the air, and sanction both the entity and the individuals who were responsible for human rights violations. Over the course of one year, Press TV was taken off the air by several satellite companies, such as Eutelsat, and in several countries, including Germany, Spain and the United States.
Human Rights Violators Database
Initiated by JFI, the Data Bank of human rights violators identifies perpetrators and collects evidence about their roles in gross human rights abuses. The specific aim of the program is to transform, redress and fight impunity in the Iranian legal systems where the judiciary is complicit with governmental transgression. Documenting organizations and individuals in violations of human rights is a JFI project which seeks to name and shame government officials who have been engaged in severe human rights violations. Through media coverage, direct sanctions and legal measures; JFI campaigns to shine the international spotlight on human rights violations of Islamic Republic of Iran officials. Many of those who were sanctioned by the European Union or the U.S. Treasury had been previously identified by Justice for Iran as human rights violators. Some of those individuals include Ali Ashraf, Esmail Ahmadi Moghaddam, Rashidi Aghdam, Morteza Kiasati, Seyed Mohammad Bagher Mousavi, Seyed Reza Mousavi Tabar, Mohammad Sarafraz, Assadollah Jafari, Hamid Reza Emadi, and Abdolsamad Khoramabadi and organizations such as IRGC's Center to Investigate Organized Crime and Ministry of Culture and Islamic Guidance.
Following advocacy campaigns by Iranian human rights activists, the Council of the European Union passed a regulation which allowed the EU to adopt restrictive measures, including travel ban and freezing of the assets, against those who were complicit in or responsible for directing or carrying out grave human rights violations.