Last year, among the events related to the violation of children’s rights in Iran, news of kidnapping, harassment, and murder of children caught attention. In the early months of this year, news of children being tortured by their family members has become hot topics. However, all of these cases indicate a lack of a comprehensive law to protect children. A law that guarantees legal protection against violent acts by parents, legal guardians, or other family members towards children. In such circumstances, it is possible to hope that people like the father of the disabled child in Alborz who used a cane to torture his child, or the stepmother and father in Mahshahr who subjected their three children to physical and mental abuse with a hammer, hot iron rod, and other objects, do not commit such tragic and regrettable acts. These two cases of child abuse have received media and public attention, while there are numerous other cases of child abuse happening in the country that are less known. As the deputy of

Although nowadays the rights of children are considered important in many countries and laws are constantly updated according to societal needs, in Iran a 54-article bill titled “Protection of Children and Adolescents” was presented to the government in 2009 by the judiciary to address legal gaps in this area. In 2011, the government removed five articles from this bill and presented it to the Islamic Consultative Assembly with 49 articles. However, after almost seven years, it is still “under review” in the Legal Commission of the Assembly. The opinions of the representatives in this regard are also very contradictory, and it is not possible to understand the reason for such delays in approving a bill that does not have any specific contradictions with other laws or religious principles in Iran.

In this issue of Khat-e-Solh, we were able to have a brief telephone conversation with Mohammad Esmaeil Saeedi, a member of the Cultural Commission of the Islamic Consultative Assembly and representative of Tabriz in the tenth parliament. Mr. Saeedi, in response to Khat-e-Solh’s question about why the bill to support the rights of children and adolescents has not yet reached the open session of the parliament and what other actions need to be taken for this bill to finally reach the session and be approved, says: “Yes, this bill has not yet reached the parliament, but if it wants to reach the parliament, it must first go to the presiding board and then it will be scheduled. However, even to have the bill discussed out of turn, about fifty of our colleagues in the parliament have decided to sign a letter. As a result, whenever this bill goes to the presiding board, it will come to the session with this request

Mr. Saeedi’s reference is to a letter that has been prepared in accordance with Article 104 of the internal regulations of the parliament. The representatives who have signed this letter hope that this action will prioritize the review of the bill for the protection of children and adolescents.

Mohammad Ismail Saeedi also responded to the question of whether he does not think that the passage of this bill could have prevented many recent cases of child abuse that have also affected public opinion, saying: “This bill must come to the open session of the parliament so that we can give our opinion on it. The bill has not yet reached the open session. The bill is not in our hands, it is in the hands of the government. The government officials should be accountable in this regard.”

At the end, this representative of the fundamentalist and member of the Stability Front admitted: “In 2013, we also had a law in support of children that came to the parliament and was approved in the commission and went through all the stages and was completed. I was also in parliament at that time and the bill had its own controversies. After that, no new bill has been introduced. This shows the government’s negligence.”

Many lawyers and activists in the field of children’s rights have criticized this bill and believe that it does not have enough executive guarantees and is more preventive in nature. However, it may be better to first approve this bill, which is said to be particularly effective in recognizing children’s statements and civil society organizations in the face of the law, and then hope for its impact.