Ahwaz Human Rights Organization(AHRO) is an international human rights advocacy NGO, registered both in the US and in Belgium. Our goal is to support and to advocate for the Ahwazi Arabs in the Southwestern Iranian province of Khuzestan (also called Al-Ahwaz or Arabistan). Ahwazi Arabs, a national and linguistic minority in Iran, are an oppressed and persecuted ethnic groups.
Our Story
AHRO was registered in the Virginia State in the United States in 1998 to defend the national, religious, linguistic and gender minorities with the focus on the human rights violation of the Ahwazi Arabs in Iran. AHRO was the first human rights organization that was registered to defend the rights of the Ahwazi Arabs. The founders of AHRO were Karim and Angela Maryam Abdian and the Hamidi brothers including Abed, Ahmad and Mohammad Hamidi.
Ahwazi Arabs
Residing mainly in the south-west of Iran, the Ahwazi Arabs are one of the Middle East’s most disadvantaged and persecuted ethnic groups. The overwhelming majority of the Ahwazi Arabs live in Iran’s Khuzestan province (accounting for some 67% of the province’s population), which occupies a geo strategically crucial position. Not only is it the gateway between the Arab world and Asia, but it also accounts for up to 90% of Iran’s oil resources. This ‘accident of natural geography’, far from being to the benefit of the local population, though, has been the source of much hardship. Whilst Khuzestan’s oil forms the backbone of the Iranian economy, its people have been viewed, at best, as an inconvenience, or, at worst, a threat, by the Iranian government. In order to eradicate their threat to the Iranian establishment, Ahwazi Arabs are subjected to a mixture of Persianisation, forced migration, violent political repression and economic exclusion.
Committee Members
Dr. Karim Abdian is a prominent human rights advocate and the director of the Ahwaz Human Rights Organization (AHRO). He has been actively involved in international forums addressing the rights of indigenous peoples, including the United Nations Permanent Forum on Indigenous Issues. Dr. Abdian has faced significant challenges, including the Iranian government’s efforts to block his representation in these forums. Despite these obstacles, he continues to advocate for the rights of the Ahwazi people and their struggle for recognition and support on the global stage.
What We Do
Ahwaz Human Rights Organization is an NGO dedicated to the defense of human rights of the Ahwazi Arab minority people in Iran – study of their history, culture, socioeconomic conditions and the political climate. AHRO combines activism with the efforts to provide important, relevant and reliable information through the dissemination of scholarly and/or scientifically researched work and newsworthy information relevant to Ahwazi-Arabs in Iran.
Mission
AHRO’s mission is to defend, document, and advocate for the rights and dignity of Ahwazi Arabs and other persecuted minorities, to expose violations to the world, and to seek justice and accountability through international human rights mechanisms.
Vision
To achieve a world in which the indigenous Ahwazi Arab people — and other oppressed ethnic and religious minorities in Iran — live with full respect for their human rights, dignity, cultural identity, equality, and freedom, free from discrimination, persecution, and systemic oppression. This underlies AHRO’s sustained work to raise international awareness, document abuses, and mobilise human rights mechanisms to protect the Ahwazi and other marginalized groups.