Next up in our series of interviews with the founders of three non-governmental organisations that work specifically with LGBT refugees is Arsham Paris, founder and executive director of the Iranian Railroad for Queer Refugees. Support Arsham Parsi by joining the IRQR group!
1. Hi there! Thanks for taking your time off for this interview. First off, could you tell us a little something about yourself?
My name is Arsham Parsi and I am the founder and Executive Director of Iranian Railroad for Queer Refugees. IRQR is an international, non for profit, queer human rights organization based in Canada. We help Iranian gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgendered refugees all over the world. We help when Iranian queers are threatened with deportation back to Iran.
I was born on 20 September, 1980, in Shiraz, Iran. After completing my basic education, I wanted to continue studying veterinary medicine at university; however, financial pressures forced me to stop my studies. While living in Shiraz and after coming to terms with my sexual identity, I began to do what I could, in a careful, discrete way, to help other gay people. Part of this work consisted of helping a doctor and doing research for a study of HIV among local gay and bisexual men. My advocacy work earned me the attention of the Iranian authorities, and I was forced to flee Iran on 5 March, 2005 due to well-known fear of persecution for being gay. My train took me first to Turkey, where I was able to register as a refugee at the office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees in Ankara. I was one of the fortunate few whose case was actually accepted by the Commissioner. Three months after arriving in Turkey my case was accepted, and two months later I was invited to Canadian Embassy in Ankara and eight months later I was arrived in Canada.
I would love to return to Iran someday but before I book my ticket, I will have to work for change.
2. What inspired you to set up IRQR? When was this?
I began secretly working for the advancement of civil rights for lesbians and gays in 2001. I established an online magazine and a Farsi radio station. In 2003, I helped organize a clandestine Yahoo chat group for gay Iranians. We called it Voice Celebration. In total there were 50 participants, making contact with each other and exchanging views on how best to achieve civil rights.
While I now live in a safe country, I still consider myself Iranian and never forget that I am in exile because of my sexual orientation. I consider this a big responsibility. I want to return to a democratic, open Iran, and am working actively to make that dream a reality. As I passed the border out of Iran in 2005, I promised myself and my country that I would one day return to a free, open country and until that time would work to achieve that goal. I consider the work I am doing today, as part of IRQR, to be an investment in a brighter tomorrow for all Iranians.
One of the major catalysts behind what I do today is the suicide of two of my friends. Later, in August 2008 I traveled to Turkey to meet with Iranian LGBT refugees and plead their case with the office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights that is located there. As the result of that trip, I felt that a new organization dedicated exclusively to helping sexual dissidents flee persecution in Iran was necessary and this was how I came to set up the Iranian Queer Railroad (IRQR). We are working to create a simple structure and focus upon supporting Iranian queers to be safe on their journey and to arrive in a new country to live and be free.
3. What have you guys done so far? Any pet project that you’re most proud of that you’d like to share with us?
IRQR is now in contact with about 200 queer Iranian refugees currently in limbo and seeking permanent asylum. Many of them are in Turkey, which shares a lengthy border with Iran and where cultural and political homophobia is rampant, while the rest are scattered throughout Europe, including the Netherlands, Sweden, Germany, Switzerland, and Norway. Many of them are in the United Kingdom, which has been extremely reluctant to grant permanent asylum to queer Iranian refugees, and where in the last several years two Iranians, Hussein Nasseri and Israfil Shiri, have committed suicide (one by burning himself alive and another by shooting himself in the head) after receiving deportation orders back to certain torture and possible death in Iran.
I have been able to make several international trips to help queer refugees and have built a relationship with other international organizations. I’m also happy to have built a strong relationship with the UNHCR in the meanwhlie, and they are now aware of the Iranian queer situation, and of our organization. And on each of my trips I’ve been able to secure international refugee protection status for more and more Iranian queer asylum seekers.
Ten years ago, if you googled “Iranian LGBT”, you wouldn’t be able to find much information, but now you can find thousands of pages. I am proud that I stood in the front line and brought queer issues out of the closet and lay them out on the table. Today, Iranian families are beginning to accept their queer children and as they are. We, Iranian queers, are working hard for a change in Iran and we are taking step by step.
4. What are your immediate plans for the year 2010?
Apart from our work among LGBT refugees, we are going to launch an international campaign to abolish the death penalty in Iran. This campaign is 346 No Execution and you can find more information about it at www.noexecution.com
Also another of our projects is to approach all governments and update their documents on queer human rights violation in Iran which needs a lot of effort and we need volunteers all around the world to help us in this important issue because it is all about life and dead for our refugees and those who left Iran on basis of their sexual orientation.
5. A number of organisations dedicated to helping LGBT refugees have sprung up over the past year. What distinguishes you from the rest?
We do not have many Iranian organizations to work with queer refugees. But there are many organizations for refugees and helping LGBT and what distinguish IRQR from other organization is that we are the only active organization that works internationally and support all Iranian queers all around the world.
6. What can concerned individuals do to help?
You can help us financially because of IRQR support is providing financial aid to refugees who needs support for their basic needs. (Editor’s note: IRQR accepts Paypal donations on their website.) If you happen to be living in Toronto, you can also help us as volunteers and work with us in person. You don’t have to be able to speak Farsi to help. We’d also like to encourage everyone to join our mailing list here so you can receive regular updates on Iranian queer issues and to find out about our other campaigns.
7. How have you been raising funds?
We have received a small amount of donations through our PayPal account so far. Some of them were just $2 but it was great and for example in 2009 we could help our refugees with more that $4000 from these donations. (As you can see, we run on a shoestring budget, but one has to start somewhere!) Also we have refugee sponsorship plan and 2010 New Year resolution that you can find more information at www.irqr.net
8. Given that the nature of your work has to be mostly underground, what systems are in place to assure your donors/supporters of fiscal accountability?
IRQR is federally registered in Canada and I am proud that IRQR has a great board of directors who are well-known Canadian queer activists and they are aware about all IRQR activities and everything is being documented. When we provide financial support for Iranian queer refugees, we keep legal transfer documents. IRQR members will receive a copy of our annual report as well. I just like to make them sure that we are doing as much as we can and we try to use their donation for refugees well being.
This is like the funniest thing we have seen in a while: Jonah Falcon, the world’s most well-endowed man, whose Prince Albert has been the subject of numerous documentaries, needs a job, and Samantha Bee tries to help him find one. Seriously, Jonah, if you’re reading this, please send us your CV! We’ll see what we can do to help you — and no, we won’t make you do porn!
Over 5,000 people have gathered in the wee hours of this morning in front of the Sydney Opera House to be photographed nude in the name of art and diversity as part of the Mardi Gras festival. Gay, straight, male, female, black, white, yellow, young and old — they came, just before dawn, to be a part of celebrity photographer Spencer Tunick’s latest installation, Mardi Gras: The Base – a tribute to the equality and sameness of individuals, regardless of their sexual orientation.
Said Tunick: “Gay men and women lay naked next to their straight neighbours and this delivered a very strong message to the world that Australians embrace a free and equal society… It was difficult to get the straight people to embrace the gay participants … I was happy we got it in the second set-up.”
Damn, this was definitely one event all of us at Gays.com HQ would have died to attend.
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This video has caused a major uproar in Singapore lately. It’s from a ‘miracle service’ in a megachurch on the city-state (yes, they’ve got those there too) where a lesbian claims to have been ‘healed’ from homosexuality. In the video, the pastor presents gay people as “dirty old men” that go around molesting little boys. He says that if the church doesn’t warn people about this, then “there will be more and more homosexuals” because “many of these people will be harrassing and seducing young boys, and they in turn will become homosexuals” and then before you know it, “half the world will be homosexual”! He then goes on to compare homosexuality with bestiality, saying that if homosexuality was allowed, then very soon people will want to get married with monkeys and donkeys and dogs, and apply for public housing with them.
Since then, a number of indignant Singaporeans — among them two prominent filmmakers — have lodged police reports against the pastor for his offensive remarks. The pastor has refused to back down, saying that he said nothing wrong at all.
Costa Rica has just elected its first ever female president — Laura Chinchilla (don’t you just love that name!) — a social conservative who opposes abortion and any move to remove the position of Roman Catholicism as the state religion. In this video shot during her campaign, Chinchilla says that Costa Rica should not discriminate based on religious beliefs, political beliefs, and “sexual preferences”. Nevertheless, she supports the idea of civil unions for gay couples — but not marriage. Now that she’s won the election, it’ll be interesting to see if she’ll live up to her own words in the days ahead, or completely forget about gay and lesbian Costa Ricans. [h/t to JoeMyGod and thanks to Blabbeando for the translation!]
As homophobic violence has intensified across the Middle East over the last two to three years, we have been hearing of increasing numbers of gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender refugees and asylum seekers. This week, Gays.com kicks off a series of interviews with the founders of three non-governmental organisations that work specifically with LGBT refugees. We hope to shine the spotlight on some of the people that are working on the front line in this arena and help them gain support from within the community for the very important work that they do. First on the hot seat is Neil Grungras, founder and executive director of the San Francisco-based Organization for Refuge, Asylum and Migration (ORAM), which was mentioned a while ago on this blog.
Hi there! Thanks for taking your time off for this interview. First off, could you tell us a little something about yourself?
Pleasure to meet you! I’m an attorney-activist. Iwent to law school in San Franciscoover twenty years ago and immediately became interested in refugee law. At the same time, I became a grass-roots activist on LGBTI issues. From 1990 until 2000, Iran a private immigration law practice here in San Francisco where I represented several gay asylum applicants. I then took a position as a country director at the Hebrew Immigrant Aid Society (HIAS), one of the most venerable migration organizations in the world. I later became director for Europe & the Middle East at that organization and also ran a large facility for US-bound refugees in Vienna, Austria under the US State Department.
LGBTIand refugee rights have been lifelong passions for me. Working in both fields together is a kind of professional “nirvana.”
What inspired you to set up ORAM? When was this?
I’veknown thousands of refugees. Many have been terribly desperate and needy. But none like sexual and gender minorities have been so systematically shunned and persecuted in so many ways andin so manyparts of the world. None are so reviled in so many societies. Few like LGBTIs have to runfrom their own families. And none have been ignored by the international community the way LGBTI refugees have.If you’re not part of the solution, you’re part of the problem, as they say. Several years ago, I began to actively incorporate LGBTI refugees into the client pool that I served at HIAS, my previous employer. The process that began five years ago culminated in my founding ORAM in June 2008.
What have you guys done so far? Any pet project that you’re most proud of that you’d like to share with us?
Our approach includes parallel tracks of client representation, advocacy and education. We’ve had enormous successin each of these three areas. On the representation front, we established the first project in the world dedicated to assisting LGBTI refugees abroad in partnership with Helsinki Citizens Assembly in Istanbul. Each LGBTI refugee in Turkeywho seeks our help receives it absolutely free. We’re now assisting 40 clients there.On the advocacy front, we’ve made inroads on severalinternational and domestic arenas, working to assure LGBTI refugees of the protection they deserve. In our education efforts, we’ve reached out to a host of academic, corporate, social, spiritual and other institutions and individuals, spreading the message that the international community can no longer ignore the plight of LGBTI refugees.
Of course, nothing can replace the exhilaration of saving a human life. Among our clients, there are a few I have a feeling would just not have made it without our help. Saving human lives will always be our greatest accomplishment.
What are your immediate plans for the year 2010?
2010 will be a watershed year for ORAM and for LGBTI refugees.We will expand our information network, reaching many more LBGTI refugees worldwide. We’ll also widen and deepen our education and advocacy efforts, with a goal of increasing awareness of the issues and admitting more LGBTI refugees to the US and other friendly countries. In 2010, ORAM will also build on its relationship with the UN High Commissioner for Refugees, augmenting protection for those we serve. Lastly, we’re launching an enormously important international survey of assistance NGOs (non-governmental organizations) to identify and to begin to address the gaping hole in international protection of LGBTI refugees.
But our work with individual refugees will remain central to our mission. In 2010, our refugee clients will begin to arrive in the US, Canada and elsewhere. We must ensure their successful reception and integration in their new homes.
A number of organisations dedicated to helping LGBT refugees have sprung up over the past year. What distinguishes you from the rest?
Our central goal is to mainstream protection of LGBTI refugees among assistance organizations. It’s a wonderful thing that more of our colleagues are including LGBTI asylum seekers in their client pools. But we’re a very long way away from reaching our goal. Most of the organizations you’re describing assist only LGBTI refugees who have alreadyentered a safe country like the US. Yet 95 percent of LGBTI refugees can’t get into a safe country in the first place. They’re trapped in decrepit camps and in remote towns and cities mostly in the developing world, afraid for their lives and safety every day. Helping these refugees is inordinately difficult and sometimes dangerous. So far, ORAM is the only organization which has said to these refugees, “We dedicate all our efforts to you.” Not despite the difficulties of doing that, but because of them.
We need more organizations to step up to the plate – to work toward the day when every refugee organization will include LGBTI refugees in its agenda.
What can concerned individuals do to help?
Fabled anthropologist Margaret Mead taught us to “never doubt that a small group of thoughtful, committed citizens can change the world.” You are one of those citizens. You can join our “Adopt-a-Refugee” program, reaching out to personally help an individual. While they’re waiting in a hostile environment to be legally recognized or resettled somewhere safe, or once they’restruggling to startover in their new country. You can work with us to organize a group of committed citizens to help LGBTI refugees in your community or you can help conduct advocacy and education. Lastly, because we’re a nonprofit, we rely on you for your donation. Please give in whatever way you can to ORAM so that we can continue and expand our life-saving work.
How have you been raising funds?
We’ve been very fortunate to receive a few generous grants from wonderful supporters,including the Arcus Foundation. We’ve also received donations from individual “angels.” These are not just LGBTI people, I’d like to add. As more people have come to know our work, more have understood that it’s purely about human rights.
But members of the community in particular understand that no matter how difficult economic times are here in the US, we must attend to the life-and-death struggles of our sisters and brothers worldwide. People are giving what they can, whether through direct donations to ORAM or through our “Adopt-a-Refugee” program. We accept all forms of donations, including online through PayPal.
Given that the nature of your work has to be mostly underground, what systems are in place to assure your donors/supporters of fiscal accountability?
ORAM is a non-profit organization registered with the US Internal Revenue Service. All our financial activities are recorded and reported in accordance with the law. True, our work has some “sensitive” aspects which we don’t advertise. But our financial records are an open book.
Anything else you’d like to tell the world to know?
We’re a worldwide family, and it’s time to begin acting like one. That means not only sharing good timeswith our sisters and brothers abroad, but also taking up their struggle to survive. Our motto,“None of us is safe until we’re all safe,” isn’t merely a platitude. It’s afact. Please stand with us today!
From NFB.ca: “This provocative documentary uncovers a lost chapter in Canadian military history: how the Armed Forces dealt with homosexual behaviour among soldiers, during and after World War II. More than 60 years later, a group of five veterans, barely adults when they enlisted, break the silence to talk about how homosexual behaviour “was even more unmentionable than cancer.” Yet amidst the brutality of war, instances of sexual awakening among soldiers and officers were occuring. Initially, the Army overlooked it, but as the war advanced, they began to crack down: military tribunals, threats of imprisonment, discharge and public exposure. After the war, officers accused of homosexuality were discharged. Back home in Canada, reputations and careers were ruined. For the young men who had served their country with valour, this final chapter was often too much to bear. Based on the book Courting Homosexuals in the Military by Paul Jackson.”
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