Official Announcement of Third ‘Public Execution’ Sentence Since Beginning of Farvardin
The prosecutor of Khorramabad, Lorestan has announced the issuance of a ‘public execution’ sentence in the case of a defendant accused of killing a law enforcement officer.
According to the “Campaign to Defend Political and Civil Prisoners,” Dariush Shahnavaaz, the general and revolutionary prosecutor of Khorramabad, without identifying the defendant, stated that he killed a law enforcement officer named Rahman Pordehqan during clashes with Lorestan security forces in December 2021.
The announcement comes several days after the Iran Human Rights Organization warned on Wednesday, April 7, about the resumption of ‘public execution’ sentences in Iran following a year-and-a-half suspension due to coronavirus.
Mahmoud Amiri-Moghaddam, the director of the organization, while criticizing the issuance of death sentences by Iran’s judiciary as a punishment that ‘violates human dignity,’ stated that contrary to claims by Islamic Republic officials, this type of punishment not only lacks ‘deterrent elements,’ but also leads to an increase in ‘cycles of violence’ in society and aims to ‘intimidate people.’
The head of Fooladshahr Court in Isfahan also announced on April 7 that two prisoners accused of killing an intelligence ministry officer have been sentenced to public execution.
The issuance and implementation of death sentences in public by Iran’s judiciary has repeatedly faced criticism from the international community.
Javid Rahman, the UN Special Rapporteur on Human Rights in Iran, in his latest report published in November 2021, called on the global community to hold Islamic Republic officials ‘accountable’ for numerous human rights violations including ‘arbitrary’ executions during 2019 and the suppression of November 2019 protests.
In his report, he expressed concern over the dramatic increase in the number of executions, particularly in cases related to ‘narcotics’ in the past year, and noted that at least 275 people, including two juvenile offenders (Arman Abdulali and Sajad Sanjari), were executed in Iran in 2021 alone.
According to the report, 40 of those executed in 2021 were Baloch citizens and 50 were Kurdish citizens.
Based on an announcement by Amnesty International in April 2020, Iran has had the highest number of executions in the world after China.
Source: Radio Farda
