Iranian dissidents, U.S. lawmakers, and analysts have all in recent days criticized what Roya Boroumand – executive director of the Abdorrahman Boroumand Foundation, a human rights group that monitors abuses in Iran – described to the Daily Beast as “the fact that human rights and democracy have not been the subject of any of” negotiations between Iran and the international community.

“The fact that human rights and democracy have not been the subject of any of these negotiations is not cause for celebration,” said Roya Boroumand, executive director of the Abdorrahman Boroumand Foundation, which monitors and tracks human rights in Iran. Since the election of Rouhani, who has been praised by anti-sanctions activists as a reformer, “the minimum has been done,” she said. The number of executions has increased, and few political prisoners have been released, she noted. “We cannot count on this government. We need international pressure for an opening.”

Iranian officials have since the election of Iranian President Hassan Rouhani conducted a wave of executions, and the United Nation’s special rapporteur on human rights in Iran recently told the U.N. General Assembly that there has been no improvement in human rights under Rouhani. Senator Mark Kirk (R-IL) tweeted on Sunday that the Iran deal includes $400 million tuition assistance for Iranian students, and called on President Barack Obama to make that assistance “contingent on Baha’is being allowed to attend universities.” The Baha’i faith is not recognized as a religion by the Islamic republic, and persecution of the community has generated human rights pressure from U.S. and Canadian politicians. Iran has sought to exclude Baha’i students from upper education and has according to Baha’i groups also “sought to close down Baha’i efforts to establish their own educational initiatives, including the Baha’i Institute for Higher Education.”

[Photo: Wilma Collins / YouTube]