The New Zealand Baha'i Community is crying foul over the sentencing of seven Iranian Baha'i leaders.

The prisoners were members of a national-level group that helped see to the minimum needs of Iran's 300,000-strong Baha'i community, the country's largest non-Muslim religious minority.

Held in Tehran's notorious Evin prison since their arrest in 2008, the two women and five men have each received jail sentences of 20 years.

"It represents an extremely disturbing outcome to the case of these innocent and harmless people," says Beth Lew, executive secretary of the National Spiritual Assembly of the Baha'is of New Zealand, "and amounts to a judgement against an entire religious community."

Nobel laureate Shirin Ebadi, whose Defenders of Human Rights Centre represented the Baha'i defendants, was reportedly stunned by the 20-year jail terms.

In a television interview broadcast by the Persian language service of the BBC she said, "I have read their case file page by page and did not find anything proving the accusations, nor did I find any document that could prove the claims of the prosecutor."

The trial consisted of six brief court appearances which began on 12 January this year after the prisoners had already been incarcerated without charge for 20 months. "During this time they were allowed barely one hour's access to their legal counsel," said Mrs Lew.

The flagrantly unjust sentence has provoked vehement protest from governments throughout the world. The European Union and the President of the European Parliament have also joined the chorus of condemnation, along with numerous human rights organizations including Amnesty International, Human Rights Watch and FIDH, plus various groups and countless individuals.

"The trumped-up charges, and the total lack of any credible evidence against these seven prisoners, reflects the false accusations and misinformation that Iran's regime has used to vilify and defame a peaceful, religious community for an entire generation," said Mrs Lew.

The national Bah' Community is again calling for the support and action of the New Zealand government.