IMHRO: Kidney trading by Iranian Security Service

Iranian Minorities’ Human Rights Organisation (IMHRO)

Ref.IMHRO.62

Life for people in the minorities’ areas in Iran is becoming increasingly desperate. As a result of poverty and lack of investment in health and education, life expectancy in many of the minorities’ areas in Iran is only about 45 years. And the harsh economical conditions are increasingly forcing people living in such areas to sell their own kidneys and other vital organs.

36 year old Omar. D a Kurd from Mariwan told IMHRO that he had to sell one of his kidneys to feed his family.

Javad. N an Arab man from Ahwaz said he sold his kidney for $500. “Is this how life should be? I live in an area with the richest gas and oil reserves in the world, yet I have to sell my kidney in order to survive. I don’t like my life.” He told IMHRO.

Reza Washahi a researcher on minorities told IMHRO: “The Iranian government deliberately does not invest in minorities’ areas and unemployment is rocketing. In the Ahwaz area instead of giving the jobs in the oil industry to local people the government gives those jobs to non-Arabs in order to encourage immigration and change the demography of the area. Late at night you can see impoverished people searching in rubbish bins for food”

We asked Omar. K why the Iranian government does not stop the trade in human organs? He said that most of medical centres buying kidneys are related to government. “It is a big business”.

Some reports indicate that revolutionary guards’ medical centres and the security service are involved in kidney trading. It is reported that they sell the organs of prisoners before execution.

Similar cases are reported in Baluchistan. Mr. S.M told IMHRO he witnessed the funeral of executed political prisoners who had scars from surgery on their kidney area. “When we asked the guards what happened to the prisoners’ kidneys they did not answer and just buried the bodies”

IMHRO is appealing to the UN to put pressure on the Iranian government to recognise the rights of minorities in Iran and to investigate the dehumanising trade in the kidneys and other organs of political prisoners.