More anti-government demonstrators in Iran are given the death penalty
Due to the ongoing anti-government protests in Iran, four people have received death sentences for “enmity against God.”
According to the judiciary’s Mizan news agency, Revolutionary Courts in Tehran said that one of the anonymous “rioters” struck and killed a policeman with his vehicle. It was claimed that the second had a knife and a revolver, while the third halted traffic and incited “fear.” Late on Tuesday, Mizan announced that the fourth had been found guilty of a knife attack.
Human rights advocates have criticized the five execution sentences since Sunday, claiming they were the outcome of biased trials.
According to Mahmood Amiry-Moghaddam, director of Iran Human Rights in Norway, “Protesters don’t have access to counsel during the interrogation phase, they are subjected to physical and mental torture to make false confessions, and they are sentenced based on the confessions.”
The court withheld the identities of the five people who had been given the death penalty, but according to Amnesty International, information about their charges had led rights advocates to assume they were Mohammad Ghobadlou, Manouchehr Mehman Navaz, Mahan Sedarat Madani, Mohammad Boroughani, and Sahand Nourmohammad-Zadeh.
They were among at least 21 people arrested on security-related charges, including “enmity against God” and “corruption on Earth,” which are capital offences under Iran’s Sharia-based legal system.
According to the Human Rights Activists News Agency (HRANA), which is also headquartered outside of Iran, at least 348 protesters have been killed and 15,900 others have been detained in a crackdown by security forces on what Iran’s government have described as foreign-backed “riots.”
Following the death in custody of Mahsa Amini, a 22-year-old woman who had been arrested by morality police for allegedly violating the strict hijab laws, protests against Iran’s religious establishment erupted two months ago.
The protests are said to have multiplied to 140 cities and towns and grown into the Islamic Republic’s biggest threat in over a decade.
