ERBIL, Kurdistan Region - A rights monitor warned on Wednesday that four prisoners in Iran could face the death penalty for their participation in the widespread anti-government protests that engulfed the country last year.
Paris-based Kurdistan Human Rights Network (KHRN), which is run by a number of Kurdish activists, warned that the four detainees in held in the central prison of the Kurdish city of Sanandaj face “serious risks” of being slammed with the death penalty.
Twenty-two-year-old Zhina (Mahsa) Amini died in police custody last September after being detained for allegedly violating the strict dress code that requires women to cover their hair. Her death sparked nationwide protests initially calling for greater freedoms, before growing into a revolution with calls for the overthrow of the Islamic regime.
The Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) and its paramilitary Basij led a violent crackdown against the protesters, killing hundreds of people and wounding thousands others.
Hengaw identified the prisoners as Keywan Zankarimi, Sardar Shahmoradi, Aram Azad, and Hosghang Chahargorgeh, adding that they are accused of “mohrabeh” a term which means “waging war against God.”
Seven known executions have been carried out in relation to the protests, all convicted of “mohrabeh.” Amnesty International has voiced its condemnation of the execution, saying the conviction is the result of “sham trials.’
The four were detained in December and have since “faced multiple instances of severe physical and psychological torture” at an IRGC intelligence detention center according to Hengaw.
Iran executed at least 576 people last year, a significant increase from 314 in 2021, making it the country with the second highest rate of known executions during 2022, according to the annual report from Amnesty International. Executions for drug-related offences increased by 93 percent.
This year, after last fall's widespread demonstrations and a crackdown on the drug trade, Iran has carried out an alarming number of executions. The Norway-based Iran Human Rights (IHR) estimated more than 350 people were executed in the first six months of 2023.
Most of those who are executed in Iran are convicted based on confessions that are condemned by rights groups who say they are often obtained under duress.
