"If a Belgian citizen is imprisoned in Iran, Belgians know how to get him back to Belgium within four weeks," said Adnan al-Mansouri in an interview with Dutch television. "One and a half year is long enough to wait till the Netherlands is doing something like that for its citizens," he added in the Dutch current affairs program ‘NOVA’.
His father, who was detained in Syria in May 2006 before being transferred to Iran, has never been visited by diplomats from the Dutch embassy Tehran he claimed.
"Nobody saw him," complained Adnan al-Mansouri. He said the Dutch government was ill informed about the fate of his father, who he claimed had been tortured in Iran. His appeal came after he earlier told Dutch media that Iran has offered to postpone the execution for a payment of roughly 80 billion Rial (IRR), about $100,000.
ROYAL AWARD
The 61-year-old Abdullah al-Mansouri, who received a Dutch royal award for his involvement in human rights, has been accused by Iran of "involvement in terrorism."
Pressured by parliament, Dutch Foreign Minister Maxime Verhagen recently discussed the issue with Iranian officials after former United Nations Secretary General Kofi Annan urged the UN and Iranian authorities to clarify Al-Mansouri’s situation.Al-Mansouri’s son said he hopes the Netherlands with the European Union and Sweden and Norway will put pressure on Iran. Besides Al-Mansouri, two Norwegians and one Swedish citizen were detained in Syria and transferred to Iran for their involvement in human rights.
Al-Mansouri had a lawyer, but he along with his wife and daughter, have been imprisoned by Iranian authorities, the Netherlands National News Agency (ANP) reported. The lawyer is reportedly facing a three-year prison term on yet unknown charges. The case was expected to be closely monitored by Christians in Iran, as Al-Mansouri was known for his involvement in defending the human rights of minorities in countries like Syria and Iran. Christians are facing persecution, several have been detained and some executed, rights groups and churches say.
POLITICAL REFUGEE
Al-Mansouri arrived in the Netherlands in 1988 as a political refugee. He lived in the Netherlands with his family in the Dutch town of Maastricht, where he was active for left-leaning political group ‘GroenLinks’ (GreenLeft) and human rights watchdog Amnesty International.
In Brussels, Dutch Liberal European parliamentarian Jules Maaten said he was concerned that "apparently the promised European pressure through diplomatic channels in Syria, Iran and the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) had not the intended affect."
He stressed that the "[death’ sentence is barbaric. Abdullah al-Mansouri is a Dutchman and a European citizen. The European Union has to use all necessary pressure to protect him." (With reporting by BosNewsLife’s Stefan J. Bos).
