The 2 males executed, Yousef Mehrad and Sadrollah Fazeli Zare, died at Arak Jail in central Iran. They’d been arrested in Could 2020, accused of being concerned in a channel on the Telegram message app known as “Critique of Superstition and Faith,” based on the U.S. Fee on Worldwide Non secular Freedom. Each males confronted months of solitary confinement and couldn’t contact their households, the fee stated.
The Mizan information company of Iran’s judiciary confirmed the executions, describing the 2 males as having insulted Islam’s Prophet Muhammad and promoted atheism. Mizan additionally accused them of burning a Quran, Islam’s holy guide, although it wasn’t clear whether or not the boys allegedly did that or such imagery was shared within the Telegram channel.
Mahmood Amiry-Moghaddam, who leads Iran Human Rights, decried the executions as exposing the “medieval nature” of Iran’s theocracy.
“The worldwide neighborhood should present with its response that executions for expressing an opinion is insupportable,” he stated in a press release. “The refusal of the worldwide neighborhood to react decisively is a inexperienced mild for the Iranian authorities and all their like-minded folks world wide.”
It wasn’t instantly clear when Iran carried out its final execution for blasphemy. Different international locations within the Center East, like Saudi Arabia, additionally permit for dying sentences to be imposed for blasphemy.
The streak of executions, together with members of ethnic minority teams in Iran, comes as monthslong protests over the September dying of 22-year-old Mahsa Amini after her arrest by the nation’s morality police have cooled. Already, a minimum of 4 folks charged over alleged crimes from the demonstrations have been put to dying. The protests, which reportedly noticed over 500 folks killed and 19,000 others arrested, marked one of many greatest challenges to Iran’s theocracy because the 1979 Islamic Revolution.
In 2022, Iran executed a minimum of 582 folks, up from 333 folks in 2021, based on Iran Human Rights. Amnesty Worldwide’s most-recent report on executions put Iran because the world’s second-largest executioner, behind solely China, the place hundreds are believed to be put to dying a 12 months.
Whereas some executions are publicized, others will not be in Iran.
Many have been for drug-related offenses, however there even have been executions of a British-Iranian accused of spying and one other of a Swedish-Iranian convicted of masterminding a 2018 assault on a navy parade that killed a minimum of 25.
A German-Iranian who lives in California, Jamshid Sharmahd, additionally faces a looming execution as tensions stay excessive between Tehran and the West over its accelerating nuclear program. The European Union’s prime diplomat, Josep Borrell, stated he spoke Monday with Iranian International Minister Hossein Amirabdollahian about Sharmahd and “requested Iran to not execute” him.
Human Rights Activists in Iran, one other group monitoring the Islamic Republic, warned final week concerning the “alarming surge” in executions.
“Iranian authorities have an absolute obligation to uphold worldwide human rights requirements and as an alternative, there’s ongoing impunity for grave violations of the best to life — and extra,” stated Skylar Thompson, the pinnacle of world advocacy and accountability on the group.
Observe Jon Gambrell on Twitter at www.twitter.com/jongambrellAP.
