Arabic teaching in secondary schools focuses exclusively on religious texts. The governor of Khuzestan is not an Arab" while "Arabs make up 35-45 percent of the three million inhabitants of Khuzestan province in the southwest of Iran." In 2005, separatist groups claimed that there was "inadequate attention to their culture and language by state media, facing discrimination in getting jobs, unfair distribution of Khuzestan's oil wealth." Joe Stork, the director of HRW's Middle East division, said: "The Iranian authorities have again displayed their readiness to silence those who denounce human rights violations. We have serious allegations the government used excessive lethal force, arbitrary arrests and torture in Khuzistan." Arab displacement and Lak poverty After a July 2005 visit to Khuzestan, United Nations Special Rapporteur for Adequate Housing Miloon Kothari reported that industrial and agricultural development had displaced Arabs from their land and they were compensated a fraction of its market value. Kothari said that new housing developments (such as a new town in Shirinshah) were being built for non-Arab workers from Yazd, while local people experienced unemployment and poor housing. He also drew attention to the Laks (an Iranian people native to the province), calling them "... a very deprived group ... living in conditions of high density, again without access to adequate sanitation and water. And just nearby, you see other neighbourhoods with much better services." Kothari's report suggested that economic marginalisation in Khuzestan is widespread. His findings led to an October 2005 European Parliament resolution condemning the forced displacement of Khuzestani Arabs. The resolution Based on Kothari's findings, the European Parliament unanimously passed a resolution in November 2006 repeating its condemnation of forced displacement in Khuzestan. Foreign influence Several Iranian opposition parties operating abroad launched a campaign to stop the American Enterprise Institute from hosting an October 2005 conference. To some, the conference indicated a new alliance between US neoconservatives and Iranian separatists before a possible invasion of Iran by the US and its allies. Ali Al-Taie, a member of the federalist Democratic Solidarity Party of Ahwaz, said during a debate: "When it comes to ethnic rights, Persian opposition groups are on the same side as the terrorist Islamic Republic. If this continues, we will see the Balkanization of Iran." He added, "Despite the long history of persecution, the Arabs of Khuzestan/al-Ahwaz are Iranian. There will never be, nor should there be, disintegration or separatism in Iran. Rather,