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Thread: Iran Capital Punishment News

  1. #51
    Administrator Heidi's Avatar
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    Iranian Pastor Youcef Nadarkhani, who faced the death penalty for "apostasy" but was recently released, has thanked those who had prayed and petitioned on his behalf during his imprisonment for nearly three years, BosNewsLife monitored Wednesday, November 28.

    In just released comments, he told supporters, “It is the opportunity for me to share about what the Lord did for me and to thank you because you supported me by your prayers, you supported my family in a very difficult time.”

    Nadarkhani made the remarks this month as a special guest speaker at the national conference of Christian Solidarity Worldwide (CSW), a Britain-based advocacy group that closely followed his case.

    “My prayer is I ask the Lord to bless you for what you did for me as a small member of the body of Christ," he told participants at the gathering in London titled 'For Such a Time as This'.

    "Today my presence here is the will of God and the result of what your prayers did for me,” said Nadarkhani. His family stayed behind but CSW told BosNewsLife that he will "shortly be returning to his family in (the city of) Rasht.

    DEATH SENTENCE

    Pastor Nadarkhani also spoke at four services at Holy Trinity Brompton church this month, CSW said.

    The pastor was sentenced to death for "apostasy", the word used for "abandoning Islam" in 2010 but released on September 8 this year after a court appearance in which he was unexpectedly acquitted of the charge but found guilty of evangelizing Muslims.

    Though sentenced to three years imprisonment, he was released as he was deemed to have already served his time.

    Iranian officials have denied wrongdoing and accused the a 35-year-old married father with two children, of being "a Zionist" and "criminal"and said their actions are aimed at defending "Islamic values".

    Despite the reported difficulties there may be at least as many as 100,000 devoted evangelical Christians in Iran, many of them former Muslims, according to mission groups.

    LARGE MOVEMENT

    Pastor Nadarkhani's congregation, which has hundreds of members, is part of the Church of Iran, one of the largest evangelical house church movements in the country,

    In several letters obtained by BosNewsLife, the pastor made clear clear that he wasn't surprised he had been prosecuted by the authorities of Iran, a strictly Islamic nation.

    Nadarkhani said the Bible tells Christians to expect persecution. The “Word of God tells us to expect to suffer hardship and dishonor for the sake of His Name. Our Christian confession is not acceptable if we ignore this statement, if we do not manifest the patience of the Lord in our sufferings,” he wrote.

    CSW’s Chief Executive Mervyn Thomas told BosNewsLife that Pastor Nadarkhani's most recent "testimony" shows his "faith and perseverance, and
    of his love for God, for his family and for his nation."

    Thomas said the pastor's "quiet courage, integrity and lack of recrimination cannot fail to have inspired anyone who heard him to deepen
    their own commitment to their faith.”

    http://www.bosnewslife.com/25011-ira...se-from-prison
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  2. #52
    Administrator Heidi's Avatar
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    Iranian "Porn" App Programmer "Repents", Narrowly Avoids Death Sentence

    Canadian government is upset by "unfair" treatment of its resident

    Saeed Malekpour, an Iranian citizen residing in Canada, was given a rather stark reminder of the drastic differences between his home nation and his current working residence when he was arrested on a family visit.

    It turns out Mr. Malekpour had created an app for a client, which was later used to post pornographic images online, a serious violation of Islamic law. Somehow Iranian authorities caught wind of this and the nation's Revolutionary Guard -- the nation's Islamist military/police organization -- arrested Mr. Malekpour when he was visiting relatives in 2008.

    In 2010, he finally was tried before the nation's Revolutionary Court, a federal Islamist court. He was forbidden to defend himself. The court found him guilty and he was sentenced to death, in a decision harshly criticized by human rights advocates and Canada who complained that its former resident "failed to receive fair and transparent legal treatment."

    Amidst the sweeping internet revolution that has occurred in recent years, the Revolutionary Court has made a special point of widely advertising cases like Mr. Malekpour's to "warn" citizens not to disobey the nation's strict Islamic law online.

    But the accused has been spared of the most severe penalty -- death -- after making a plea where he "repented" for his actions. The decision to suspend the death sentence was announced on Eid al-Fitr, the day at the end of Ramadan where people of Muslim faith commit to charity and peacemaking. The holiday is known as a day on which Iran sometimes pardons prisoners.

    Mr. Malekpour's lawyer announced the pardon on Iran's Mehr news agency, commenting, "After the sentence was confirmed my client repented for his actions. With this repentance, the death sentence has been suspended."

    But the Revolutionary Court, according to Reuters, has not officially announced the suspension. And even if it is, such decisions have been reversed in the past says The Toronto Star. It points the case of Hamid Ghassemi-Shal, a Toronto shoe salesman who was accused of being a spy and sentenced to death. Mr. Ghassemi-Shal was similarly reported to be spared, but his family was recently informed that the death sentence had been reinstated. It is unknown if he has been executed, but in April 2012 his sister was told the execution was "imminent".

    The stories serve as a grim reminder that while Iran has advanced remarkably in terms of industry and technology, it remains very much entrenched in archaic and punitive legal traditions.

    Sources: Reuters [on the NYTimes], Toronto Star
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  3. #53
    Administrator Heidi's Avatar
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    "semi-official"

    S. Arabia Sending Death Convicts to Syria to Help Rebels

    Top secret documents leaked to the media disclosed on Sunday that Saudi Arabia has been dispatching death convicts to Syria to join the armed campaign against President Bashar a-Assad's government.

    The documents include the orders which have been issued to grant amnesty to criminals from Saudi Arabia, Yemen, Syria, Egypt, Pakistan, Jordan, Somalia, Kuwait, Palestine, Afghanistan and Sudan - who had been waiting in the death row in Saudi jails - in return for joining the terrorist war on the Syrian government.

    According to the document, the Saudi Interior Ministry has conceded to pardon these people who have been sentenced to death on charges of drug trafficking, murder and rape after they accepted to go under military trainings and be sent to Syria to help terrorist groups and the FSA in the war on President Assad.

    Families of the convicts do not have the right to leave Saudi Arabia, but they receive monthly salaries from the Al Saud regime.

    The regime has taken the families hostage to make sure that the criminals remain loyal to their missions and plots in Syria.

    Pardoning inmates in return for terrorist operations in Syria is not confined to Saudi Arabia, and Qatar and some other Persian Gulf states have followed suit.

    The Iraqi media disclosed late November that Persian Gulf Arab states have released and sent 3,800 of their death convicts to Syria to join the armed rebels.

    So far, a number of 3800 prisoners who were waiting for capital punishment in some Persian Gulf Arab states, including Qatar, Saudi Arabia and Kuwait, have been released and dispatched to Syria to join the armed revolt against the government of President Bashar al-Assad," Director of Iraq's al-Nakheel News Agency Mohammad Ali al-Hakim told FNA at that time.

    He said all costs of the dispatch of these convicts to Syria are covered by Valid Tabatabaei, the representative of the Salafis and Wabbites in Kuwait's Parliament.

    Tabatabaei underlined his full support for armed rebels and terrorists fighting the Syrian government during an address to an anti-government protest rally in September.

    Syria has been experiencing unrest since March 2011 with organized attacks by well-armed gangs against Syrian police forces and border guards being reported across the country.

    Hundreds of people, including members of the security forces, have been killed, when some protest rallies turned into armed clashes.

    The government blames outlaws, saboteurs, and armed terrorist groups for the deaths, stressing that the unrest is being orchestrated from abroad.

    In October 2011, calm was eventually restored in the Arab state after President Assad started a reform initiative in the country, but Israel, the US and its Arab allies are seeking hard to bring the country into chaos through any possible means. Tel Aviv, Washington and some Arab capitals have been staging various plots in the hope of increasing unrests in Syria.

    The US daily, Washington Post, reported in May that the Syrian rebels and terrorist groups battling the President Bashar al-Assad's government have received significantly more and better weapons in recent weeks, a crime paid for by the Persian Gulf Arab states and coordinated by the United States.

    The newspaper, quoting opposition activists and US and foreign officials, reported that Obama administration officials emphasized the administration has expanded contacts with opposition military forces to provide the Persian Gulf nations with assessments of rebel credibility and command-and-control infrastructure.

    According to the report, material is being stockpiled in Damascus, in Idlib near the Turkish border and in Zabadani on the Lebanese border.

    Opposition activists who several months ago said the rebels were running out of ammunition said in May that the flow of weapons - most bought on the black market in neighboring countries or from elements of the Syrian military in the past - has significantly increased after a decision by Saudi Arabia, Qatar.

    http://english.farsnews.com/newstext.php?nn=9107125672
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  4. #54
    Member Member VladVoivode's Avatar
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    In my opinion Heidi, this is a tricky situation. There is ancient precedent in this practice. Gladiators in ancient Rome who proved their worth in the arena were at tkimes allowed to join a regular Roman legion - bear in mind that gladiators were criminals. That said, I have very ambivalent about Iran's use of the DP in general. I do not believe for instance that apostasy should be a capital offense, but that assertion is of course based upon a Westrn, non-Islamic perspective. But further complicating the matter is Iran's reason for doing this. As you are well aware, the Arab League has been distancing itself from Iran due to its continued human rights violations and its burgeoning uranium enrichment program that could lead to Iran possessing nuclear missile capability. Conventional short range launchers are alreafy in their possession. All Iran needs to do is launch one nuke at Israel and it's Armageddon. My take on Iran's action in this is a desperate attempt to divert attention away from their nuclear program as well as believing the world will turn a blind eye to their continuing human rights violations.

    What Assad is doing in Syria is deplorable, but, what Iran is doing to its people is no less deplorable. Iran is a pariah for the most part and this is nothing more than a ruse also for Iran to take advantage of a larger effort to remove a political rival.

  5. #55
    Administrator Heidi's Avatar
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    This is a sticky situation. I posted this article in Iran Capital Punishment News instead of Saudi Arabia Capital Punishment News!
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  6. #56
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    Iran executes its citizens at a faster rate

    Human rights organizations are outraged by ever-increasing executions of dissidents, bloggers and activists in Iran. In the world's most execution-prone country, even misdemeanors draw the death penalty.

    The human rights situation in Iran has deteriorated over the last few months, according to a UN report. Indeed, news about the hanging of ten individuals at the end of October in a Teheran prison due to charges of drug trafficking drew criticism from around the world. The hangings were in violation of international law, which dictates that the death penalty be limited to only the "most serious felonies." That was clearly not the case in Teheran. There are also serious doubts regarding the fairness of the trial against the accused, says the report by the UN Commission on Human Right (UNCHR).

    London-based human rights organization Amnesty International called the executions a "state killing-spree," noting that 344 people have been executed in Iran since March.

    UN special correspondent Ahmad Shaheed confirmed Amnesty's numbers in his latest Iran report from the end of October. More than 300 executions have taken place since the beginning of 2012, he says. That number was 670 in 2011, ranking Iran as the country with the most executions per capita in the world.

    Yet of those 670 executions in 2011, 249 were carried out behind closed doors. Human rights organizations worry that the secret execution of Iranian citizens has included a significant proportion of political activists or those belonging to religious or ethnic minorities.

    Observers have also observed an ever-increasing number of executions in just the last 2 months - which have not been limited to drug trafficking. Within a 2-week period, between 30 and 80 Iranian citizens were executed, UN special correspondent Shaheed said - basing his estimates on information from families of the executed and from human rights activists in Iran.

    Intimidation of the populace and opposition

    Shirin Ebadi, the Iranian Nobel Prize winner who's been living in exile in the UK since 2009, said she views the recent executions as an attempt by Iranian authorities to intimidate the Iranian populace and frighten them from demonstrating politically. The regime would like to send a signal to the opposition that it is prepared to use force and brutality, Ebadi told Deutsche Welle.

    Abdolkarim Lahiji, vice president of the International Federation of Human Rights Leagues, likewise reads the increasing number of executions as an attempt to intimidate. The Iranian lawyer believes that only Iran's supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, could be behind "these inhuman measures." Without Khamenei's consent, such a campaign would be unimaginable.

    But Iran observers say such measures are a sign of Khameni's weak reign and leadership. He can boast few achievements to his citizens, and due to international sanctions, he and his country are between a rock and a hard place.

    Khomeini has been involved in Iranian politics and defense for 35 years Civil society strengthened under pressure

    The recent executions are not the only matter to prompt international criticism. The suppression of political dissenters, journalists and human rights activists remains part of the country's agenda - or has increased up, said UN special correspondent Shaheed in his latest report.

    Nasrin Sotoudeh, one of the country's best-known human rights activists and a lawyer, has been incarcerated since August of 2010 on charges of "conspiracy against national security." She recently ended a hunger strike in Teheran's Evin prison, after Iranian deputies agreed to loosen punitive measures against her family. In October 2012, Sotoudeh was awarded the Sakharov Prize for Freedom of Thought from the European Parliament, along with film director Jafar Panahi.

    Sotoudeh was sentenced to 11 years in prison after the disputed 2009 re-election of Ahmadinejad On December 15 of this year, the German city of Bochum will also award its human rights prize to 2 Iranians: human rights lawyer Javid Hutan Kian and workers' rights activist Shahrokh Zamani. Both are currently incarcerated in Iranian prisons and, according to human rights activists and the Bochum award's website, both have been severely tortured.

    Death of a blogger

    Media suppression has also intensified in Teheran. One of many such cases was the closing of independent newspaper "Sharg" after it published cartoons critical of the government. In addition, according to Shaheed's report, some 40 journalists are currently behind bars.

    Beheshti's family may never know how he died New to Iran is the "Internet police." The organization, called FATA, has kept critical or "immoral" bloggers under surveillance since its founding in 2011. Blogger Sattar Beheshti, who was imprisoned on October 30, died three days later in the custody of this police unit. The case caught the attention of the political establishment in Iran, resulting in a parliamentary enquiry and investigative committee. The chief of FATA was fired and other police officers suspended.

    The attorney general admitted that Beheshti was beaten while under arrest - but that this was not the cause of death.

    Source: Deutsche Welle
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  7. #57
    Administrator Heidi's Avatar
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    New Executions in Vakilabad- About 500 Executions in One Prison Since October 2012

    On February 3, Iran Human Rights (IHR) reported that secret executions in Vakilabad prison had resumed after several months’ halt due to international reactions. The executions began in October 2012 and have been taking place on Wednesdays and Sundays every week. On a few occasions there have been three weekly executions. Each time, at least ten prisoners are hanged; on two occasions in November and December, thirty-five and fifty prisoners were executed respectively. The executions take place in complete secrecy, and the phone lines of the prison are cut off several hours before the executions. - Neither the prisoners nor their families and lawyers (if they have them) are informed about the executions in advance.

    Tens of prisoners, among them a possible minor, executed on February 10 and 13

    Reliable reports from Vakilabad prison indicate that the mass executions are still taking place. IHR has now received more details about the mass executions which occurred on Sunday, February 10 and Wednesday, February 13. According to these reports, at least ten prisoners were executed on February 10, while the number of prisoners executed on Wednesday February 13 was much higher. Most of those executed were convicted of drug related charges. However, a possible minor offender was among those executed on February 13: a young boy who had just turned eighteen and was convicted of murder. According to our sources, the boy was allegedly a minor and under narcotic-induced psychosis when he committed the offence.

    Many Afghan citizens among those executed:

    IHR has also received reports about a significant number of Afghan prisoners among those executed in the Vakilabad prison in the past few months. The bodies of the executed Afghan prisoners, which were not transferred to Afghanistan, are buried at a section of the Mashhad Cemetery (Behesht-e-Reza) along with the bodies of the other prisoners executed secretly in Vakilabad. This part of the cemetery is monitored by cameras and patrolled by the Iranian security forces. A recent report from BBC Persian supports IHR’s reports on execution of Afghans in Vakilabad. On February 23, BBC Persian reported that bodies of five Afghan prisoners, who were executed in Iran, were buried in the Kalafgan district of Takhar Province in Afghanistan. Quoting the families of those executed, the report says that about 80 people from this district have been executed in the last six months in Iran. The report said that 50 bodies were trensferred to Afghanistan while the remining bodies are being kept at cold rooms in Iran.

    United Nations must intervene

    Based on the new information about the mass executions in Vakilabad, IHR has sent an urgent appeal to the United Nations (UN) to send a fact finding mission to Iran. IHR spokesperson Mahmood Amiry-Moghaddam said: “What is going on in Vakilabad is a massacre. These are arbitrary and unlawful mass executions that must be stopped[…] We urge the UN to send a fact finding commission to Iran immediately and we ask the international community to react. Hundreds or possibly thousands of the prisoners can be executed in the coming months.” Amiry-Moghaddam also urged the Afghan government to follow up the situation of its imprisoned citizens in Iran more closely, saying, “Afghan citizens are among the weakest in the Iranian society. Many of those imprisoned do not have access to lawyers and their execution is violation of international obligations. Unfortunately, the Afghan government doesn’t seem to pay much attention to its imprisoned citizens in Iran.”



    Overfilled prisons Iranian authorities’ motivation for the mass executions?

    According to unconfirmed reports, there could be as many as 3,000 death row prisoners in Vakilabad in danger of execution in the coming months. IHR believes that secret executions also take place in other Iranian prisoners. In its annual report from 2011, IHR reported confirmed secret executions in fifteen different Iranian prisoners. One of the reasons for the secret mass executions in Vakilabad and other Iranian prisons is that the prisons are overfilled. According to official Iranian reports, there are 600,000 prisoners in the Iranian prisons. IHR’s sources estimate that there are 20,000 prisoners in Vakilabad, though the prison only has the capacity to house 4,000 inmates. According to eyewitnesses, in some of the wards the prisoners have to sleep on the steps and in the corridors. The situation is similar in several other Iranian prisons, and it seems that mass execution of the death row prisoners is one of the solutions Iranian authorities have sought to overcrowded prisons in Iran.

    http://iranhr.net/spip.php?article2729
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  8. #58
    Administrator Heidi's Avatar
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    ANNUAL REPORT ON THE DEATH PENALTY IN IRAN- 2012

    Iran Human Rights will present the "Annual report on the death penalty in Iran 2012" with the French NGO "Ensemble Contre la Peine de Morte" (ECPM) today.

    PDF version of the full report can be uploaded here:



    A short version of the report is presented below.

    Introduction:

    The fifth annual report of Iran Human Rights (IHR) on the death penalty in Iran is an assessment of how the death penalty was used in 2012. Due to harsh crackdowns on civil society, non-existing freedom of press and lack of transparency of the Iranian judicial system, the present report by no means covers all death penalty cases in Iran. The report is the result of efforts by human rights defenders, members and affiliates of IHR in Iran who, on some occasions, took serious risks to help provide a more accurate picture of the death penalty than the official channels do.

    The number of executions in 2012 in Iran is among the highest in more than 15 years. Besides the confirmed numbers, it is believed there is a large number of unannounced executions.

    Annual 2012 report at a glance:

    • At least 580 people were executed in 2012 in Iran.

    • 294 cases (51%) were reported by official Iranian sources.

    • 286 cases included in the annual numbers were reported by unofficial sources.

    • Only 85 out of the estimated 325 secret executions carried out in Vakilabad Prison in 2012 are included in the present report.

    • At least 76% of executions included in this report were due to drug related charges.

    • 60 executions were carried out in public in 2012. 46% of all public executions were carried out in the province of Fars (southern Iran).

    • One third (20) of those executed in public were convicted of drug-related charges.

    • At least 27 Afghan citizens and one Pakistani citizen were executed in in 2012.

    • At least 9 women were executed in 2012.

    • IHR has received reports of secret or ‘un-announced’ executions in more than 15 different Iranian prisons.

    The Annual Report on the Death Penalty in Iran – 2012 is being published at a time when Iranian society heads toward an uncertain future. Socio-economic conditions worsen each day, and in June 2013 another round of Presidential elections will commence in Iran. Keeping in mind the 2009 post-election protests in Iran and the Arab Spring in 2010 and 2011, Iranian authorities are well aware that the outcome of new protests in June 2013 may be even worse than the protests in 2009. They are therefore doing the maximum to prevent new protests. Spreading fear through society is the Iranian authorities’ main oppressive strategy, and the death penalty is their most important instrument to do so.

    Since the protests in 2009, the number of executions, particularly public executions, has risen dramatically. Public executions in 2012 were more than six times higher than numbers from 2009. The trend continues in 2013. Just in January and February 2013 alone, 20 people were hanged in public. Other demonstrations of horror were carried out in 2013, including the Taliban-style public hanging of a young man in a football (soccer) stadium in Sabzevar , the public executions of two young men, who were convicted of mugging charges , and the public amputation of a man’s fingers in Shiraz .

    Secret executions in Vakilabad Prison in Mashhad (northeastern Iran) have resumed. Since October 2012, IHR has received reports of weekly executions in Vakilabad Prison, where probably several hundred prisoners have been executed so far. IHR has included only a small portion of those executions in this report; only those that have been confirmed by at least two independent sources. IHR and ECPM characterize mass executions in Vakilabad Prisonas a massacre and have urged the United Nations to send a fact-finding mission to Iran to investigate these executions . There are also reports of unannounced executions in several other Iranian prisons, such as Rajai Shahr Prison in Karaj. Death row prisoners in this prison live under the constant fear of execution .

    Drug-related charges still account for the majority of executions in Iran, and most prisoners executed on drug-related charges are unidentified. These prisoners do not receive coverage from international media, campaigns do not exist to help save their lives, and their executions do not typically lead to international attention. However, in 2012, victims of the Iranian regime’s ‘war on drugs’— which is supported by UNODC—were finally given a face.

    Saeed Sedighi, a young man tortured to confess to drug trafficking, was sentenced to death after an unfair trial and executed in October 2012. His execution was postponed for one week due to an international campaign initiated by several human rights organizations as IHR and ECPM, statements issued by UN Special Rapporteurs, and reactions from the international community. Many death row prisoners in Iran are treated in a similar manner. They are subjected to torture, coerced confessions, unfair trials, and their cases do not receive appropriate attention.

    IHR and ECPM along with other human rights groups have urged the UNODC to halt all fundings to Iran as long as prisoners, convicted of drug-related charges, are facing the death penalty.

    IHR and ECPM are also concerned about death row prisoners from ethnic regions in Iran, especially the Arab, Baluchi, and Kurdish prisoners who remain at imminent danger of execution.

    In 2012 four imprisoned Ahwazi Arab activists were executed and death sentences for five more (Mohammad Ali Amourinejad, Hashem Shabani, Hadi Rashedi, Mokhtar Alboshoka and Jaber Alboshoka) Ahwazi Arab activists, charged with “Moharebeh”, were upheld by the Iranian Supreme Court.

    Six Salafist Kurdish prisoners were executed in December 2012 in Tehran and more are awaiting on death row.

    Zanyar and Loghman Moradi, two Kurdish death row prisoners continue to be at imminent danger of execution. Less information is available regarding Baluchi death row prisoners, but according to IHR reports, many Baluchi prisoners have been executed in other Iranian prisons outside Baluchistan.

    http://iranhr.net/spip.php?article2740
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  9. #59
    Senior Member CnCP Legend JimKay's Avatar
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    Iran executions anger Afghan families

    Dozens of Afghans have been executed in recent months across the border in Iran, mostly for drug related offences. ...

    Human rights groups estimate more than 4,000 Afghans are currently on death row in Iran, most for drug-related offences. Village elders here say they have compiled a list of more than 100 names of those executed in the past six months, 80 of those bodies have been returned.

    The majority of Afghans are locked up in Mashhad's Vakilabad prison. Others are incarcerated at the Ghezel Hesar prison in Karaj, west of the Iranian capital Tehran, and the Kerman and Zahedan's central prisons also hold a large number of Afghans, says Mahmood Amiry-Moghaddam, Iran Human Rights (IHR) spokesman in Norway.

    http://www.aljazeera.com/indepth/fea...037670360.html

  10. #60
    Administrator Heidi's Avatar
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    Iran Human Rights Analysis: Relationship between political events and the death penalty trends in Iran

    After a short break in the executions due to the presidential elections of June 14, a new wave of executions started on June 20 in Iran. According to the official Iranian sources 38 people have been executed in the last three weeks. In addition at least 44 executions have been reported by human rights groups in the same period. Altogether according to official and unofficial reports at least 82 prisoners have been executed in different Iranian cities during the three weeks after the presidential elections.

    According to Iran Human Rights’ annual reports in the past years, between 70-80% of those executed in Iran are convicted of drug related charges.

    Iranian authorities have repeatedly claimed that the high number of executions in Iran is due to Iran’s struggle against the international drug trafficking, since Iran is on the transit line between Afghanistan and Europe.

    Iran Human Rights (IHR) and other human rights groups have previously claimed that Iranian authorities use the death penalty as an instrument to spread fear in the society in order to prevent protests and to remain in power.

    In this report IHR has analysed the relation between the number of executions and the political events in the period of 2007 to 2013 in Iran. Only executions that have been announced by the authorities are included in this analysis.

    The summary of the analysis is shown in the diagram above.

    The analysis (indicated in the above diagram) shows that the number of executions drop significantly in the weeks of the Presidential or Parliamentary elections (black vertical lines). The months before and after the elections the executions reach a peek. The highest number of monthly executions took place in July 2009, the month when the post-election protests started. Moreover, there is a peek in the executions prior to when the protests are expected, such as the anniversary of the student uprising in 1999 (July 8-9: 18 Tir), anniversary of February 14 2009 (25 Bahman). Green vertical lines in the diagram indicate the periods when the authorities fear uprising)Besides, the number of announced executions is low Iranian new year holidays (Nowrouz, 21. March) and the Muslim holy month of Ramadan and it is generally high around the Christmas holidays and in January.

    IHR is currently conducting a more detailed analysis of the execution trends in the last 10 years in Iran and the results will be presented in the near future.

    Commenting the present analysis Mahmood Amiry-Moghaddam, the spokesperson of IHR said: The present analysis indicates that there is a meaningful correlation between the execution trends and the political events in the country. In some occasions it seems that the Iranian authorities choose the timing of the executions in a coordinated and non-random manner. In general the execution numbers are high when the authorities fear protests and the numbers are low when the world’s focus is on Iran.

    Regarding the low number of the executions during the elections Amiry-Moghaddam said: One possibility might be that during the elections the authorities have to give more space to the people in order to encourage their participation in the elections, at the same time as the world’s focus is on Iran and many international journalists are visiting the country one week before and after elections. However, in the weeks prior to and after the elections the number of the executions reaches a peak.

    http://iranhr.net/spip.php?article2831
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