ERBIL, Kurdistan Region - A rights organization reported on Tuesday the killing of an Arab citizen in Iran by “direct fire” in the city of Ahvaz in Iran’s southwestern Khuzestan province following their vehicle’s pursuit, after which security forces transferred injured passengers to an undisclosed location.
A vehicle carrying Ali Zogheibi and his companions was pursued by security and law enforcement forces before forces opened fire, Mojahwaz, a local community-based platform dedicated to human rights in Ahvaz reported late Monday, killing Zogheibi and injuring others.
“Security forces immediately transferred the wounded to an undisclosed location,” said the watchdog with Oslo-based Human rights organization Hengaw confirming his transfer on Tuesday, adding that “security and police forces removed Zagheibi’s body from the scene.”
Arabs in Iran constitute up to 4 million (less than four percent) of a nearly 94 million population. Residents of Khuzestan are known as “Ahwazi Arabs” and are prone to “economic hardship as well as the suppression of their language,” according to London-based Minority Rights Group.
The incident came a day after a dozen Ahvazi Arabs were handed charges of armed rebellion, waging war against God, and disrupting public order - charges carrying the death penalty - from an investigative court in Khuzestan province following their arrests during the 40-day US-Iran against the backdrop of a widespread internet shutdown for alleged cooperation with the US and Israel and blowing up pipelines, Mojahwaz reported Monday.
“Human rights activists consider these charges to be largely based on forced confessions extracted under torture and to lack legal credibility,” the group said on Monday, adding that “reports indicate that the detainees were subjected to severe torture and that forced televised confessions were obtained from them.”
Amnesty International in late May denounced authorities’ use of force, documenting forces having “exploited the cover of war to further crush civil society“ through arbitrary arrests and threats against protestors and “civil society activists… unlawfully killed or arbitrarily executed,” with particular attention to “ethnic minorities, including Ahwazi Arabs, Baluchis, and Kurds; and religious minorities, including Baha’is and Christians.”
Iran Human Rights (IHR) published a report on Saturday, marking World Day Against the Death Penalty, documenting the executions of at least 617 people in Iran in 2026 alone - an average of more than two executions per day - at least 14 of which were against Arab ethnic minorities, alongside 54 Baluchis and 43 Kurds.
