Iran: Halt Moves to Curtail Lawyers: Via Human Rights Watch.

(New York) - Iran's government should withdraw new regulations that severely limit the independence of the Iranian Bar Association and would give the government control over a lawyer's right to practice, Human Rights Watch said today.

Revised implementing regulations (bylaws) to the law establishing the independence of the Bar Association would give the Judiciary, whose head is appointed by the Supreme Leader and which oversees the Justice Ministry, the decisive role in approving lawyers' licensing applications. The Bar Association has exercised that right for the last 50 years, and the 1955 law establishing the bar's independence says that the law cannot be changed without the bar's approval.

"This so-called reform would allow the government to hand-pick the lawyers who are allowed to practice," said Joe Stork, deputy Middle East and North Africa director at Human Rights Watch. "What we see here is a naked effort to intimidate Iranian defense lawyers at a time when the government is detaining hundreds of people without charge."

On June 17, the head of the Judiciary, Ayatollah Mahmoud Shahroudi, approved revisions to the bylaws of the 1955 law establishing the independence of the Iranian Bar Association. The revised bylaws take effect immediately and do not require approval by parliament or any other government body. Two provisions gravely undermine the bar's independence, giving the government the ability to deny political critics and human rights defenders the right to practice as lawyers. 

According to senior Iranian lawyers, the head of the Judiciary has no power to make such changes in the bylaws without consulting the Bar Association. Shirin Ebadi, the Nobel Laureate and prominent human rights defender, told Human Rights Watch that Shahroudi is "well aware" that he has no legal authority to decree these changes. "He seems to have approved this bylaw [change] under political pressure," she said.

Read Original Article:(Via Human Rights Watch.)