By Goya Dmytryshchak
Hobsons Bay’s Baha’i community will pray this month for the release of seven of the faith’s leaders imprisoned in Iran for seven years.
Members of the faith are launching a week of global action on May 14, ‘Seven days in remembrance of seven years for Seven’.
Hobsons Bay Baha’i community spokesman Peter Seery said it was shocking that religious prejudice could lead to the five men and two women being sentenced to 20 years imprisonment for practising their religious beliefs.
Mr Seery said the Baha’i faith taught that all the world’s faiths came from God.
“We believe in the harmony of religions and that men and women should have equal rights and opportunities,” he said.
“We believe world peace is not only possible but inevitable.
“The Baha’i faith is not political – we support the government wherever we live – but these people have been imprisoned and worldwide we’re campaigning to have them released.”
Mr Seery said it was pleasing to have bipartisan support from Australia’s leadership, which has joined worldwide condemnation of the seven’s detention.
“It’s very pleasing that Foreign Minister Julie Bishop, like her predecessor Bob Carr, has called for the release of the seven Baha’i leaders,” Mr Seery said.
“We were also very pleased to see a bipartisan motion in the House of Representatives recently which called for an end to the persecution of Baha’is in Iran.”
The Baha’i community is Iran’s biggest non-Muslim religious minority.
There are about six million Baha’is worldwide.
