10:00GMT—6:00AM/EST
Washington,24 September (WashingtonTV)—Iranian Nobel Peace Prize laureate, ShirinEbadi, on Thursday accused Britain of ignoring the Iranian government’scrackdown on the opposition movement, in order to safeguard talks onTehran’s suspect nuclear program.
Ebadi,Iran’s most prominent human rights lawyer, said her worst fears wereconfirmed when she saw the British ambassador to Tehran at IranianPresident Mahmoud Ahmadinejad’s inauguration in August.
“That’s when I felt that human rights were being neglected,” she said in an interview with the London-based daily, The Times.
Ebaditold The Times that sanctions should have been imposed against Iranover its violent crackdown on protesters after Ahmadinejad’s disputedvictory in the 12 June election.
“I’mvery sorry to say the West cares more about its own security than humanrights. I think they’re wrong … Undemocratic countries are moredangerous than a nuclear bomb,” she told the daily.
Ebadi,who was in Spain at the time of the 12 June election, has not returnedto Iran since, on the advice of her colleagues – many of whom have beenarrested.
Her husband and her brother have repeatedly been summoned to Iran’s Intelligence Ministry, and have been told to silence Ebadi.
However, Ebadi vowed to continue highlighting the Islamic Republic’s human rights abuses.
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