[Congressional Bills 118th Congress]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office]
[H. Res. 100 Introduced in House (IH)]
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118th CONGRESS
1st Session
H. RES. 100
Expressing support for the Iranian people's desire for a democratic,
secular, and nonnuclear Republic of Iran, and condemning violations of
human rights and state-sponsored terrorism by the Iranian Government.
_______________________________________________________________________
IN THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES
February 7, 2023
Mr. McClintock (for himself, Ms. Brownley, Mr. Feenstra, Mr. Bishop of
Georgia, Mr. Cline, Mr. Wilson of South Carolina, Mr. Owens, Mr.
Veasey, Mr. Rutherford, Mr. Menendez, Mr. Loudermilk, Mr. Kilmer, Ms.
Clarke of New York, Mr. Johnson of Louisiana, Mr. Pappas, Mr. Diaz-
Balart, Mr. Amodei, Mr. David Scott of Georgia, Mr. Calvert, Mr.
Finstad, Ms. Sherrill, Mr. Evans, Mr. Allen, Mrs. Gonzalez-Colon, Mr.
Ruiz, Mr. Mike Garcia of California, Mr. Valadao, Mr. Garbarino, Mr.
Rogers of Kentucky, Mr. Vargas, Mr. Lawler, Mrs. Cherfilus-McCormick,
Mr. Cardenas, Mr. Flood, Mr. Allred, Mrs. Napolitano, Ms. Wexton, Mr.
Ruppersberger, Ms. Tenney, Mr. Grothman, Mr. Pascrell, Mr. Moran, Mr.
Latta, Mr. Bost, Ms. Escobar, Mr. Nehls, Mr. Williams of Texas, Mr.
Wenstrup, Mr. Phillips, Mrs. Steel, Mr. Fallon, Mr. Ellzey, Ms.
McCollum, Mr. Balderson, Mr. Lieu, Mr. Vicente Gonzalez of Texas, Mr.
Smucker, Mr. Turner, Ms. Lofgren, Ms. Salazar, Mrs. Miller-Meeks, Mr.
Hern, Mr. Larson of Connecticut, Mr. Bergman, Mr. Tony Gonzales of
Texas, Mr. Mooney, Mr. Armstrong, Mr. Garamendi, Mr. Davis of Illinois,
Mr. Murphy, Mr. Mast, Mr. Luetkemeyer, Mr. Stauber, Mr. Bera, Mr.
Williams of New York, Mr. Hill, Mrs. Fletcher, Mr. Aderholt, Mr. Weber
of Texas, Mr. Ezell, Mr. Pence, Mr. Arrington, Mr. Self, Mr. Moskowitz,
Mr. Gottheimer, Mr. Nunn of Iowa, Mr. Sherman, Mr. Webster of Florida,
Mr. Dunn of Florida, Mr. Fitzpatrick, Mr. Hudson, Mr. Gooden of Texas,
Mr. Cohen, Mr. Moore of Utah, Mr. Bacon, Ms. Jackson Lee, Mr.
Bilirakis, Mr. Womack, Mr. Carter of Georgia, Mr. Babin, Mr. Sessions,
Mr. Wittman, Mr. Burchett, Mr. Duncan, Ms. Mace, Mr. Simpson, Mr.
Moolenaar, Mr. Jackson of Texas, Mr. Clyde, Ms. Craig, Ms. Wilson of
Florida, Mr. Guest, Mr. Guthrie, Mr. LaMalfa, Ms. Granger, Ms. Sanchez,
Mr. Norman, Mr. Trone, Mr. Torres of New York, Ms. Ross, Mr. Green of
Texas, Ms. Kamlager-Dove, Mr. Krishnamoorthi, Mr. Biggs, Mr. Gimenez,
Mr. Courtney, Mr. Higgins of New York, Mr. Lamborn, Mr. Crawford, Mr.
McCormick, Mr. Austin Scott of Georgia, Mrs. Watson Coleman, Mrs.
McBath, Mr. Perry, Mr. Fulcher, Mr. Obernolte, Mr. Costa, Mr. Peters,
Ms. Chu, Ms. Garcia of Texas, Mr. Stanton, Ms. Norton, Mr. DesJarlais,
Mr. Issa, Mrs. Lesko, Ms. Spanberger, Mr. Stewart, Mr. Hunt, Mr. Barr,
Mr. Westerman, Ms. Malliotakis, Mr. Boyle of Pennsylvania, Mrs.
McClain, Mr. Fleischmann, Mr. Reschenthaler, Mr. Johnson of Ohio, Mr.
Crenshaw, Mr. Payne, Mr. Ferguson, Ms. Barragan, Mr. Kiley, Mr. Kelly
of Mississippi, Mr. Timmons, Mr. Rouzer, Mr. Tiffany, and Mr. C. Scott
Franklin of Florida) submitted the following resolution; which was
referred to the Committee on Foreign Affairs
_______________________________________________________________________
RESOLUTION
Expressing support for the Iranian people's desire for a democratic,
secular, and nonnuclear Republic of Iran, and condemning violations of
human rights and state-sponsored terrorism by the Iranian Government.
Whereas, beginning in 2017, and continuing for several months after protests
erupted in more than 100 cities, the Iranian regime suppressed such
protests with repressive forces that resulted in at least 25 deaths and
4,000 arrests, including decorated wrestling champion Navid Afkari, who
was later executed in September 2020 amidst international outrage;
Whereas, on November 15, 2019, popular protests against the Iranian regime began
and rapidly spread to at least 100 cities throughout the country, and
reports indicate that Iranian security forces used lethal force and
about 1,500 people were killed during less than 2 weeks of unrest, and
thousands more were detained during these protests;
Whereas, beginning in September 2022, antigovernment protests ignited in
response to the death of Mahsa Amini, a 22-year-old Kurdish Iranian
woman who was arrested by the morality police that enforce Iran's
mandatory dress code laws;
Whereas women and youth have led the 2022 protests in Iran, demanding social
freedom and political change;
Whereas these protests are rooted in the more than four decades of organized
resistance against the Iranian dictatorship, which have been most
recently led by women who have endured torture, sexual and gender-based
violence, and death;
Whereas in several months of continuing protests in hundreds of cities
throughout Iran, the regime's security forces have killed hundreds and
arrested tens of thousands of protesters, two of whom, Mohsen Shekari
and Majidreza Rahnavard (both 23 years old), were hung on December 8 and
12, 2022, in Tehran and Mashhad; meanwhile, dozens more have been
convicted of ``Moharebeh'' (waging war on God), and are at risk of
execution;
Whereas, according to a December 9, 2022, Amnesty International report, ``Iran's
security forces have killed with absolute impunity more than 40 children
and injured many more in a bid to crush the spirit of resistance among
the country's youth and retain their iron grip on power at any cost'';
Whereas the similarity in slogans and tactics used by protests nationwide
reflect the overarching demands of the Iranian people and point to the
organized nature of the protests;
Whereas, in the 116th Congress, the House of Representatives passed House
Resolution 752, ``Supporting the rights of the people of Iran to free
expression, condemning the Iranian regime for its crackdown on
legitimate protests, and for other purposes.'';
Whereas House Resolution 752 urges the Administration to work to convene
emergency sessions of the United Nations Security Council and to work
with United States partners and allies to condemn the ongoing human
rights violations perpetrated by the Iranian regime and establish a
mechanism by which the United Nations Security Council can monitor such
violations;
Whereas, on November 24, 2022, the United Nations Human Rights Council
established a fact-finding mission to conduct an independent
investigation into the ongoing deadly violence related to the protests
in Iran that began on September 16, 2022;
Whereas, on December 14, 2022, the United Nations Economic and Social Council
(ECOSOC) adopted a resolution to expel Iran from the Commission on the
Status of Women (CSW) for the remainder of its 4-year term ending in
2026;
Whereas the Department of State's 2021 Country Reports on Human Rights
Practices, released on April 13, 2022, cites that Iran's ``government
and its agents reportedly committed arbitrary or unlawful killings, most
commonly executions for crimes not meeting the international legal
standard of `most serious crimes' or for crimes committed by juvenile
offenders, as well as executions after trials without due process.'';
Whereas, on October 25, 2021, the United Nations Special Rapporteur (UNSR) on
the situation of human rights in the Islamic Republic of Iran, Javaid
Rehman, told the United Nations General Assembly that almost all
executions in the country constituted an arbitrary deprivation of life,
noting the ``extensive, vague and arbitrary grounds in Iran for imposing
the death sentence, which quickly can turn this punishment into a
political tool.'';
Whereas the Iranian regime has arbitrarily and brutally suppressed ethnic and
religious minorities, including Iranian Kurds, Baluchis, Arabs,
Christians, Jews, Baha'is, Zoroastrians, and even Sunni Muslims, and
deprived them of their basic human rights, and has in many cases
executed them;
Whereas the Iranian people have been deprived of their fundamental freedoms for
which reason they are rejecting monarchic dictatorship and religious
tyranny, as evident in their protest slogans;
Whereas, in the 115th Congress, the House of Representatives passed H.R. 4744
calling on the United States to ``condemn Iranian human rights abuses
against dissidents, including the massacre in 1988 and the suppression
of political demonstrations in 1999, 2009, and 2017, and pressure the
Government of Iran to provide family members detailed information that
they were denied about the final resting places of any missing victims
of such abuses'';
Whereas, on January 13, 2022, a United Nations report has urged ``the
international community to call for accountability with respect to long-
standing emblematic events that have been met with persistent impunity,
including the enforced disappearances and summary and arbitrary
executions of 1988 and the November 2019 protests.'';
Whereas the killings of thousands of political prisoners in 1988 were carried
out based on a fatwa to execute all political prisoners who remained
loyal to the Iranian Resistance, and subsequent death commissions were
formed on July 19, 1988, whose members included the current Iranian
regime's President, Ebrahim Raisi, an official from the Ministry of
Intelligence, and a state prosecutor, to implement the fatwa;
Whereas the United States should be involved in any establishment of an
international investigation into the 1988 extrajudicial killings of
Iranian dissidents;
Whereas senior Iranian Government, military, judicial, and security officials
have for decades ordered or committed egregious human rights violations
and acts of terror;
Whereas, on June 30, 2018, tens of thousands of people gathered in Paris at the
Free Iran gathering where they supported advocates for a democratic,
secular, and nonnuclear Republic of Iran, and showed support for the
opposition leader Mrs. Maryam Rajavi's 10-point plan for the future of
Iran, which calls for the universal right to vote, free elections, and a
market economy, and advocates gender, religious, and ethnic equality, a
foreign policy based on peaceful coexistence, and a nonnuclear Iran;
Whereas, on July 2, 2018, the Belgian Federal Prosecutor's Office announced it
had foiled a terrorist plot against the ``Free Iran 2018-the
Alternative'' gathering held on June 30, 2018, in support of the Iranian
people's struggle for freedom;
Whereas Assadollah Assadi, a senior Iranian diplomat based in the Iranian
embassy in Vienna, Austria, was arrested in Germany and on February 2021
convicted in Belgium and sentenced to 20 years of imprisonment in
connection with the planned terror plot in Paris at the Free Iran
gathering;
Whereas Assadollah Assadi served as the third secretary of the Iranian embassy
in Austria;
Whereas instead of representing the interests of the Iranian people, the Iranian
regime has long used its Foreign Ministry and diplomatic representations
abroad to orchestrate terror plots and whitewash gross human rights
violations in Iran;
Whereas, on December 15, 2022, the Special Court for Combatting Corruption and
Organized Crime (SPAK) in Albania sentenced an Iranian national to 10
years in prison on terrorism-related charges, including attempts to
engage in espionage against, and the assassination of Iranian dissidents
in Albania;
Whereas Iran's malign activities in the Balkans pose a serious threat to United
States national security interests;
Whereas, on November 23, 2022, the Department of the Treasury announced
additional action on Iranian security forces, including Islamic
Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) forces, for their violent crackdown on
antigovernment protests in Iran's Kurdistan Province and surrounding
areas; and
Whereas, according to the statement issued by the Department of State, on
November 23, 2022, ``The United States continues to support the Iranian
people as they protest nationwide'': Now, therefore, be it
Resolved, That the House of Representatives--
(1) condemns past and present Iranian state-sponsored
terrorist attacks against United States citizens and officials,
as well as Iranian dissidents, including the Iranian regime's
terror plot against the ``Free Iran 2018-the Alternative''
gathering in Paris;
(2) calls on relevant United States Government agencies to
work with European allies, including those in the Balkans where
Iran has expanded its presence, to hold Iran accountable for
breaching diplomatic privileges, and to call on nations to
prevent the malign activities of the Iranian regime's
diplomatic missions, with the goal of closing them down and
expelling its agents;
(3) stands with the people of Iran who are legitimately
defending their rights for freedom against repression, and
condemns the brutal killing of Iranian protesters by the
Iranian regime; and
(4) recognizes the rights of the Iranian people and their
struggle to establish a democratic, secular, and nonnuclear
Republic of Iran.
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