Separate Congregational Prayers of Sunnis and Shias at Iran's Unity Conference

The 28th International Islamic Unity Conference was held in Tehran this year, during which, according to some published photos, Shias and Sunnis did not hold a joint congregational prayer. The publication of images showing these two separate prayers in the same location last week caused a stir. The newspaper Jomhouri Eslami reported on Saturday, January 20, that the manner of holding the prayers surprised observers. The newspaper emphasized: 'While in the Prophet's Mosque and the Grand Mosque in Medina and Mecca, Shias and Sunnis pray together in unified rows, witnessing two separate prayers during the Unity Conference is absolutely unacceptable.' On Friday, January 19, Iranian security forces prevented the holding of a Sunni Friday prayer in Tehran led by Mawlawi Abdolhamid Ismailzahi, who had traveled to Tehran to attend the Unity Conference. On the same day, some websites in Iran published a photo of Mawlawi Abdolhamid's conversation with the Supreme Leader of the Islamic Republic, Ayatollah Khamenei, on the sidelines of the meeting with Unity Conference participants. The website Alef, close to Ahmad Tavakoli, a representative from Tehran in the parliament, referred to Mawlawi Abdolhamid's 'critical positions' and deemed this incident 'noteworthy.' There is a one-week difference between Sunnis and Shias regarding the birth date of Muhammad ibn Abdullah, the Prophet of Islam, which was designated as the Unity Week by the initiative of Ayatollah Hossein Ali Montazeri, the then Deputy Leader, and supported by Ayatollah Khomeini, the founder of the Islamic Republic, to set aside differences between Shia and Sunni. Every year, a meeting with this title is held in Iran. Meanwhile, on Saturday, January 20, the representatives of Sistan and Baluchestan province in the Iranian parliament issued a statement condemning 'terrorist' actions in the province and called for the formation of a joint committee between the parliament and the government to 'prevent similar incidents.' This assembly also requested that the representatives of Sistan and Baluchestan province in the parliament be included in this committee. According to the state news agency IRNA, the statement reads: 'This assembly, while strongly condemning the recent terrorist actions, calls for the formation of a joint committee between the parliament and the government with the presence of representatives from Sistan and Baluchestan province to prevent similar incidents.' On Thursday, January 11, a teacher and a member of the Basij force in the 'Nasirabad' village, near the city of Rask in Sistan and Baluchestan province, were killed by two motorcyclists. Hussein Rahimi, the police chief of Sistan and Baluchestan, reported the arrest of 12 individuals in this regard. The assassination of these two occurred less than a week after the killing of two members of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps along with a Basij member at the Saravan border in Sistan and Baluchestan province. On Wednesday, December 5, three police officers in the Zahak county of Sistan and Baluchestan were also killed while on patrol. Additionally, according to Iranian officials, an armed attack on Iranian police forces in Sistan and Baluchestan province in October resulted in the deaths of six police officers. In this context, the arrest of 'members of a terrorist team' in southeastern Iran, the request from a cleric to condemn hostile Shia and Sunni channels, and the security forces' prevention of the Sunni Friday prayer in Tehran are noteworthy.