Tag: history

What next for Iran’s overlooked minorities?

It is an anxious time to be Iranian, but even more so if you’re part of a minority community. Will the US assault on Iran lead to a mass exodus or a longed-for new start?

Five days since the start of President Trump’s bombing of Iran and the assassination of its senior leaders, the question of what comes next hangs in the air like plumes of dust from the rubble.

Lord (William) Hague has summarised the options as “repression, chaos or liberation”. Repression – again – by the country’s brutal Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps, chaos if the country falls into civil war, and liberation if somehow millions of Iranians welcome the pro-Western Reza Pahlavi to lead the country to democracy.

Reports that Mojtaba ​Khamenei, the son of assassinated Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, is tipped to be the frontrunner, have set the needle hovering between the first two of those options.

It is an anxious time to be Iranian, but even more so if you’re part of a minority community. Why do they matter? The Islamic Republic is not just home to Shia (89 per cent) and Sunni Muslims (10 per cent), but to ancient communities of Zoroastrians, Jews, Baha’i and Assyrian and Armenian Christians. Their very presence in the Islamic Republic challenges its ideology, and they have complained of being treated like second-class citizens.

Even more problematic for the regime are Shia who abandon the national creed and become atheist, or Evangelical Christian. A 2020 report found some 1.5 per cent of Iranians identified as Christian, meaning converts alone could number around 500,000. But because “apostates” can face jail, some have fled Iran. Some wash up on UK shores – and in such numbers that the Church of England has devised a Farsi-language Communion liturgy for them. Each conversion away from Shi’ism is a quiet rejection of the 1979 Revolution.

Above: Article 18 advocates for the rights of Iranian Christians

Iranian-born Dr Sara Afshari, research tutor at the Oxford Centre for Mission Studies, has described “religious disengagement and conversion” as a form of political dissent.

Writing during the January protests, in which the IRGC slaughtered 3,000 demonstrators according to official figures (or up to 30,000 according to activists) she explained: “For many, conversion has not been only a spiritual journey, but a symbolic refusal – an existential “no” to religious coercion and political control.”

Steve Dew-Jones, news director of the charity Article 18, says he worries that if the regime clings on, it could hit out at its minority populations and those in prison or awaiting trial, who include nearly 60 Christians. (Update: Reuters has reported Evin prison, where many are held, has been bombed and Open Doors has said food distribution and communications have been cut off and prisoners are being moved to undisclosed locations.) A fresh wave of state-sponsored repression could, according to Le Monde, catch anyone picked up by facial recognition cameras.

Other easy targets whose arrests would spread fear would include members of “underground” congregations. Those initially dancing in the streets have included Iranians of all creeds – but minorities are easy to scapegoat. The regime, which enjoys spying on its own people, won’t give up without a fight: the Revolutionary Guard is believed to have more than 190,000 members embedded deep in the country’s population of 93 million, in addition to the forces of the Iranian Army.

Resources on the Diocese of London's website for Farsi-speakers
Above: Some Church of England dioceses offer materials for Iranian worshippers, noting “many have powerful testimonies of … transformation – often at great personal cost”

A variant of this possibility, “regime readjustment”, could see a tamed regime allowed to continue, on conditions set by the US, as has happened in Venezuela. Iran’s nuclear capabilities and oil reserves would be obvious targets for US negotiators but Trump has not condemned Iran’s poor religious rights record.

Quite a contrast from the US’s intervention in Nigeria on Christmas Day, which Trump framed as protecting the country’s Christians from genocide, or even the 2003 Iraq invasion, which President Bush justified as a mission to export democracy. So if the Iranian regime is permitted to carry on as before except in a few areas, Christian persecution will most likely carry on unchecked.

However, if US-Israeli bombing removed any new leader and enough of the regime for separatist groups to start civil conflict, the ensuing chaos could be even worse for Iran’s minorities. According to CNN, the CIA is working to arm Kurdish forces and other Iranian opposition groups with the aim of fomenting a popular uprising in Iran.

Certainly the 2003 US-led invasion of Iraq and the messy collapse of Saddam Hussein’s government led to total social disintegration. An exodus of minorities followed, that included an estimated five-sixths of Iraq’s Christians. These were ordinary citizens who had had enough of being scapegoated by compatriots and forgotten by US-led troops.

US military planning, such as there was, had not bargained on an Al Qa’eda insurgency or the emergence of ISIS. Both jihadist militias were catastrophic for minorities, and their indulgence in gruesome killings succeeded in attracting new recruits from around the world.

Iranian Christians know they are socially vulnerable and could be made more so by a breakdown in law and order. If they felt it was safer to flee, we might see more of them at Calais and in our churches.

Violence can spread quickly in the Middle East. Last night the Chaldean Catholic Archbishop of Erbil in the Kurdish region of northern Iraq posted on X that drones had damaged an apartment block built for local Catholics, and a nearby convent. Again some Iraqi Catholics are fearing that they should flee.

Liberation might seem the most far-fetched of the possibilities on Iran’s horizon, with a secular democracy that contributed to the peace and stability of the whole region. It is clear that there is huge popular support inside Iran for greater freedoms – freedom for women to discard the veil, freedom to walk away from Shi’ism, freedom for Iran’s LGBT community to become more visible.

The American values the revolutionaries rejected in 1979 seem less objectionable to many Iranians now; American exports such as iPhones and Instagram have proven a hit. This would be the best environment for Iran’s minorities to thrive as equal citizens. But is it possible to leap from autocracy to democracy?

Dew-Jones believes so. “If there was any chance that the people could actually decide and be empowered,” he says, then peaceful regime change could occur, led in the short term by exiled prince Reza Pahlavi, “who appears to be the person whom Iranians inside and outside, not exclusively but by and large, are calling on to lead the transition.”

Realistically, if the US wants Iran to morph into a secular, liberal, non-nuclear regime, it will have to help pay for it. One lesson, from Egypt where the so-called Arab Spring failed to bring about lasting change, is that democracy is not achieved in one regime change or one election: it is the gradual building up of a multi-layered culture of empowerment, respect and rights.

However, another lesson, from Iraq, whose current stability is far from perfect, is that without adequate planning and support, a poorly defined hope of regime change can take years to realise and cost hundreds of thousands of lives.

Above: Aida Najaflou, an Iranian convert to Christianity, who was arrested in February 2025 and has been sentenced to 17 years in jail for offences against the Islamic Republic including involvement in an underground “house church”, the longest sentence given an Iranian Christian last year related to their faith. Photo: Article 18

Can the former chief nursing officer heal the fractured Church of England? 

Bishop Sarah Mullally’s appointment as the next Archbishop of Canterbury is ground-breaking but she inherits a fractured Church. What comes next?

Congratulations to the Rt Revd and Rt Hon Dame Sarah Mullally DBE, who has today been announced as the 106th archbishop of Canterbury and the first woman to occupy the role.  

Her move from just north of the river, as bishop of the diocese of London, is one of shortest distances on the episcopal chess-board. But she arrives at a desk where the in-tray overflows: divisions persisting around how far the Church should recognise gay relationships, ongoing factional point-scoring, and a long-term slow decline in the numbers of dedicated, generous members (bar a modest post-Covid bounceback). 

There is of course, good news; the Bible Society’s findings of a “quiet revival”, especially among young men, should gladden the heart of any church leader. The robust discussion around where the Church should allocate its finances has led to a hearty public defence of the humble parish and the system that has for centuries been the nation’s unofficial safety net. And the Church’s work to address racism and links to historic slavery is giving the Church more of a right to speak up when racism spills anew on to our streets or seeps back into our public discourse.  

As one of the first women bishops, Archbishop-designate Sarah is no stranger to moving into worlds dominated by men, by tradition, by Old School ways. This will surely serve her well. And women leaders are generally seen as more trustworthy when it comes to handling situations of abuse. 

Much has been made of the fact that several provinces in the Anglican Communion, over which she is now “first among equals”, do not recognise female leadership. Closer to home, the campaign group Watch, Women and the Church, say 1 in 12 bishops do not fully accept women as priests or church leaders. (Parishes that don’t are given “flying bishops”.) Today on Twitter/X the group added: “the Archbishop of Canterbury will not be able to celebrate communion in 439 churches – simply because she is a woman”. Meanwhile a statement from Forward in Faith welcomed her while noting that a 2014 agreement meant “provision for an assured sacramental ministry for traditional catholics would continue as before”, with “the consecration of Society bishops … undertaken exclusively by other Society bishops”. Is this a triumph of Anglican “living with difference” or a failure of unity?

I’m also interested in how her first meeting with Pope Leo XIV will go. Her predecessor Justin Welby got on famously with Leo’s predecessor, Francis, who referred to him as “brother Justin”. Catholics who long to see women ordained in the Catholic Church, or at least given more space to use their gifts in the Church, will be watching closely. It calls to mind the photo of Queen Elizabeth II giving the Saudi King Abdullah a spin in her Landrover at a time when women in his country were not permitted to drive. (I’m not equating the Catholic Church with the Saudi kingdom, though 11 years after his eye-opening ride, women’s capabilities were recognised and the ban lifted.)

As for the Church’s need to prove its integrity on dealing with abuse victims with the utmost seriousness, what is needed? A clean sweep, a new broom? Clearing away cobwebs? I’m wanting a metaphor that points to the new archbishop signalling a decisive and much-needed clean start in all sorts of areas where cobwebs lurk.

At 37, Mullally became the youngest chief nursing officer in England. Now she is to become the most senior bishop in the Church of England. Anglicanism’s other famous nurse, Florence Nightingale, would be thrilled. She is quoted as saying, “I attribute my success to this – I never gave or took any excuse.” That could be a good medicine for a Church that suffers from periodic lethargy. 

It’s too easy and almost too hackneyed to do down the Church of England, with its deep divisions and widening differences. But the nation’s not in great shape either. That means there’s plenty of space for Archbishop-designate Sarah to articulate a renewed vision of the nation, one that is hopeful, compassionate, just, wise and varied, but united around common goals.

Photo: Archbishop of Canterbury-designate Sarah Mullally. Credit: Lambeth Palace

Visiting the Thames Barrier – the fiddliest daytrip in London

Its gleaming gates rise from the murky waters of the River Thames, and next week one of the country’s most under-sung feats of engineering will receive a visit from one of its highest-profile fans, the Emperor of Japan. But for most of us, planning a trip there is unbelievably fiddly.

Its gleaming gates rise from the murky waters of the River Thames like towers in a medieval castle wall, and next week one of the country’s most under-sung feats of engineering will receive a visit from one of its highest-profile fans.

The Emperor and Empress of Japan are making a private trip to the Thames Barrier before the engagements of their state visit next week. According to a touching article in The Times, Emperor Naruhito, when crown prince, devoted his postgraduate thesis to the river while at Oxford University in the 1980s.

And why shouldn’t they? To stand only metres from one of those giant rotating gates is awe-inspiring.

Except, unless you’re the Emperor of Japan and have imperial levels of administrative support (well, access to private boat trips and chauffeurs), the planning is unbelievably fiddly. In which case, read on.

For the steel-gated super-structure is surprisingly inaccessible.

I wanted to go because my five-year-old son is a budding engineer, into steam trains, diesels, modern trains, trams, buses and so on – and his grandparents were visiting us.

We needed a rainproof daytrip with multi-generational appeal, ie suitable for differing concentration spans and levels of mobility: one member of the group would want to run around constantly; another member would really not.

Even in five years, minus the lockdowns, we’ve ticked off many London attractions. So I cast my mind east and settled on the Thames Barrier. It’s one of the largest movable flood barriers in the world, according to the Environment Agency. And climate change is only making flood defences more topical. The other adults assured me they wouldn’t find it too nerdy.

That was the easy part. I imagined there would be a visitor centre just next to the barrier, from where a boat-trip would take visitors right up close. And a shop where you could buy postcards, cups of tea and books about Charles Draper, the engineer whose cooker’s gas taps gave him the inspiration for the rotating gates.

I adjusted my expectations when I found the barrier isn’t obvious from Google Maps. Que?

And if you want to pass between its gates by boat, the nearest pier is more than 1.5 miles away from the visitor centre car park.

Let’s start with the boat part.

You can take the Uber Clipper, which sails through the barrier, to Royal Woolwich Arsenal, disembark, have a quick coffee, and sail back the other way. There is a Thames Barrier Park on the other side of the river, so, on your return trip you’d need to hop back only one stop to Royal Wharf Pier, and then it’s a 15-20-minute walk away. Apparently there’s a great café there and some eye-impressive topiary, but we didn’t get there because the mobility issues put it out of our reach.

Yours to print out and draw on any missing elements

So accustomed am I to Google’s omniscience that I feel cheated when it turns out to be fallible and I should have consulted other, more British maps, such as Streetmap. So Royal Woolwich Arsenal, for example, is not just the old military buildings turned into tidy streets of private residences. A coffee shop is squeezed into one of two Grade 2-listed guardrooms, and the large Visitors’ Book Café, which has a full brunch menu, sits just the other side of a courtyard adorned with sculptures. Neither of these was obvious in advance. Had they been, we could have enjoyed some shakshuka or avocado on sourdough – tastier than a hasty sandwich on the boat.

Between the pale grey sky and murky grey river we sailed, and passing through such powerful gates was a privilege, if a fleeting one. The Thames Barrier Park being out of our reach, we opted to pad our day out with a quick stop at Greenwich, where the grounds of the Cutty Sark, with their benches and ice cream vans, are clearly more accustomed to welcoming visitors.

There is a visitor centre, next to the barrier, but it’s only open – and its phone is only picked up – for five hours on a Saturday. The boat stops a further 1.7 miles away, so if you want to visit, you’ll need a bus or a car. We returned to Royal Woolwich Arsenal, picked up our car and drove east down a busy A road through a markedly unloved part of town that has you questioning your eyes and your memory. Did I really see a sign? Did it really point down here?

Past the tired garages and up and down over untarred roads finally looms a tall, more promising sight. Sadly, having wanted to prioritise the boat trips, we arrived at the centre at 3.37pm to find it shut. Peering through a window of the centre I saw a notice that said the centre was only open by prior appointment.

Finally paying homage, from the Thames Path beyond the shut Visitor Centre

Nonetheless, being close to the steel that was dazzling in the sunlight that had finally broken through, reinforcing the awe of seeing the structure from the water. The Thames Path bears an attractive mural of the course of the river from its source, though that its main audience when we visited – joggers – looked straight ahead. As for our five-year-old, awe-struck as he was, he also really enjoyed the little play park outside the visitor centre.

This last part will be less important to Their Majesties, but I hope their visit sparks a new interest in the structure that leads to it becoming easier to admire up close and be inspired by. There are some great things to see and do here, but it took perseverance to make them align. And the next time I go to an attraction and inwardly grumble that its marketing is too slick, I’ll remember what a hassle it is to visit something less joined up.