Journalists Covering Death Of Mahsa Amini To Stand Trial Next Week

Amir Raisian, one of the lawyers of Mohammad Ghobalou, said Tuesday that the supreme court has upheld his client’s death sentence regardless of the objections and documents that could potentially exonerate him.

The judiciary claims that Ghobadlou "killed an officer and injured several others" by running over them with his car during protests. He was given the death sentence in initial hearings on charges of "corruption on Earth"and “Moharebeh” in a session without the presence of his lawyer. Later, a court in Tehran issued a verdict, sentencing him according to the Islamic criminal code to ‘qisas,’ or punishment in kind.

Moharebeh (also transliterated as muharebeh) is an Islamic-Arabic term that in the lexicon of the Iranian regime means "fighting God” or “war against God,” and carries the death penalty. “Corruption on earth” is also another term that carries the death penalty. ‘Qisas' is a Quranic principle similar to “an eye for an eye” or the law of talion.

His lawyer added that the court rejected their appeal, saying that documents issued by the forensic and legal medicine authorities about Ghobalou’s mental health, as well as footage of CCTV images, are not related to this stage of the procedure. Raisian said the court did not inform them about the timing of his execution.

Ghobalou’s family and his lawyers have published medical documents, proving that he has been under treatment for bipolar disorder for at least seven years.

According to Dadban, a team of volunteers who provide legal advice to activists and protest victims, the circumstances surrounding the death of the police officer – identified as Farid Karimpour Hasanvand – reeks of contradictions, adding that Ghobalou was not involved in any fatal accident. “The forensic report shows that the police officer was killed as a result of being hit on the head by a hard object and definitely in a fight, not an accident,” a narrative that had been confirmed by police commanders at the officer’s funeral.

Clara Anne Bünger, founder and board member of Equal Rights Beyond Borders, a Greek-German human rights organization enforcing has taken on the political sponsorship of the 22-year-old.

“The EU must ensure that judges like him never find a safe place in the EU,” Bünger had said in a tweet.

The Islamic Republic has intensified its killing trend in recent weeks, fueling further protests across the country. Unrest this week followed the hanging of demonstrators Majid Kazemi, Saeed Yaghoubi and Saleh Mirhashemi on May 19.

The deaths brought to at least seven the number of protesters hanged since nationwide protests broke out in September 2022 following the death in custody of 22-year-old Mahsa Amini. The unrest posed the biggest internal challenge to the Islamic Republic since its establishment in 1979.

Also on Tuesday, Amnesty International said at least seven individuals in Iran face the death sentence in connection with protests, while dozens of others are at risk of being sentenced to death.

“The authorities have violated their fair trial rights and subjected many to torture and other ill-treatment, including floggings, electric shocks, death threats and sexual violence,” the human rights group added.

In a letter to Iran’s chief justice Gholamhossein Mohseni-Ejei, Amnesty said, “On 19 May, authorities arbitrarily executed Majid Kazemi, Saleh Mirhashemi and Saeed Yaghoubi, who were unjustly convicted and sentenced to death in a trial that relied on torture-tainted 'confessions’ and which bore no resemblance to meaningful judicial proceedings.”

So far, around 500 civilians have been killed by security forces and at least 20,000 arrested. While many have been released, around 1,500 face criminal charges, and at least 80 detainees face the death sentence.

According to unconfirmed reports, at least 10 underage protesters are also facing death sentences for the “moharebeh” and “corruption on earth”.

Amir Velayati, a 24-year-old man, who lost his eye during the first week of protests triggered by the September death of Mahsa Amini, was detained as the Iranian regime intensified pressures against protesters.

According to one of his friends, Velayati was rejected by several hospitals when he was injured but finally was admitted to one where he was told a pellet was lodged 1 millimeter away from his brain, Iran Wire reported in March.

Harsh Naqshbandi, an actor and theater director is another victim who lost an eye and was arrested in recent days with no information about his current whereabouts either.

Parsa Ghobadi, another protester who lost both eyes, was detained along with his brother recently. He was released after a few days, but his brother is still in custody.

Meanwhile, Iran International's sources report threatening phone calls from security organizations to women whose eyes were damaged in last year's nationwide protests, asking them not to write anything about their injury on social media.

Last month, a report by Norway-based Iran Human Rights confirmed earlier speculations that the Islamic Republic security forces have been systematically targeting protesters’ eyes.

The human rights group documented over 20 cases of people being blinded in one eye as a result of fire from the security agents during protests, adding that initial data indicates young women were disproportionately represented among people who had sustained such injuries.

The students of Tabriz University of Medical Sciences received the punishments for participating in a rally back in March against attacks which have affected thousands of girls across the country.

Last week, over 2,000 students signed a petition demanding the cancellation of the heavy sentences of the disciplinary committee against their colleagues.

Close to 300 schools were targeted in the past Iranian year without any apparent serious effort by the government to identify and pursue the perpetrators, nor to explain to terrified parents and students what was happening.

A new wave of chemical attacks began after the new year holidays in late March.

Thousands of students have been affected, mostly girls, with hundreds hospitalized and symptoms including respiratory distress, numbness in their limbs, heart palpitations, headaches, nausea, and vomiting.

Iran's student movement gained momentum last year amid the "Woman, Life, Freedom" protests following the death in custody of Mahsa Amini. Universities were the scene of large anti-regime demonstrations.

According to the US-based Human Rights Activists News Agency (HRANA), 637 students from 144 universities have been arrested since mid-September.

Some sources inside Iran have also announced that the number of detained students is more than 700.

Milad Bahmanzadeh, who had been convicted of murder and sentenced to death, died of a heart attack in Tabriz prison northwest of Iran because of the huge stress and anxiety of his possible execution, Hengaw Organization reported.

Bahmanzadeh lost his life on Sunday, hours after he was transferred to the special ward where prisoners on death row are held.

Over the past few weeks, the Islamic Republic has hanged dozens of prisoners, including protesters, as part of an execution spree widely condemned by the international community.

The number of executions in Iran started to rise after President Ebrahim Raisi – the former head of the country’s notorious judiciary -- took office in August 2021 but the recent exponential spike has triggered concern at home and abroad.

The United Nations said earlier this month that Iran has executed 209 people so far this year, calling the record "abominable". The number has further grown in recent days, particularly with the regime's execution of three political prisoners Majid Kazemi, Saleh Mirhashemi and Saeed Yaghoubi.

Last week Amnesty International condemned the execution spree, and said it "opposes the death penalty in all cases without exception, regardless of the nature or circumstances of the crime; guilt, innocence or other characteristics of the individual; or the method used by the state to carry out the execution."

“The regime is taking revenge for the revolutionary movement by executing and killing people,” human rights activist Narges Mohammadi told inmates who gathered Saturday evening at the courtyard of the women’s ward to protest the execution of three political prisoners in Esfahan Friday.

Mohammadi argued that unlike the 1980s when the regime executed thousands of political prisoners to establish and stabilize its tyranny, the recent executions will only strengthen the people’s determination to overthrow the Islamic Republic. 

Majid Kazemi, Saeed Yaghoubi and Saleh Mirhashemi were handed down the death sentence in a trial condemned as a travesty of justice by human rights campaigners, who say the prisoners were tortured into confessions, and there is no reliable evidence against them.

The three men were convicted over the death of two IRGC’s Basij militia members and a police officer during protests last November in Esfahan. Leaked audio from police radio chatter from the night the three regime agents were killed indicates that they were shot by friendly fire of plainclothes forces. The accused even had alibis for the time the agents were killed, with the family of one of the victims claiming there was CCTV video footage of their son at work.

Friday's executions brought to at least seven the number of protesters hanged since the beginning of the nationwide protests last September, which turned into one of the boldest challenges to the clerical rulers since the 1979 revolution. The protests were ignited by Mahsa Amini's death in the custody of Iran's morality police.

“Execution and taking people’s lives has turned into a despicable everyday practice in the Islamic Republic,” Faezeh Hashemi, the daughter of former President Akbar Hashemi-Rafsanjani said at the same gathering. “Execution of three protesters in Esfahan [last week], two in Tehran [in December], executions of 209 in five months, 580 in one year, 14 executions in one day, 22 executions in two weeks…,” she went on to say. 

Hashemi accused the regime of using executions to “shut the mouths of critics and dissidents and to escape accountability over the appalling situation in the country” and it also signals the regime’s fear of the people.

She denounced executions “under any pretext, including for impertinence against the prophet, insult against sanctities, taking up arms against the regime, blasphemy, corruption on earth and even for drug trafficking” because, she said, “justice has been taken to the slaughterhouse”. 

Hashemi, a former lawmaker who launched Zan daily for women during the presidency of reformist President Mohammad Khatami in late 1990s, is an outspoken critic of Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei. 

Activists and politicians at home and abroad, as well as family members of protesters killed by the regime have extensively condemned the recent executions. Several neighborhoods in the capital Tehran, Esfahan and in a few other cities were scenes of protests against the regime’s executions last week. Students at universities across Iran also staged demonstrations. 

Over 170 activists and politicians in Iran in a joint statement released Sunday dubbed the executions a “systematic murder by the government and demanded the immediate annulment of all death sentences.

A group of political prisoners including reformist politician Mostafa Tajzadeh, also an outspoken critic of Khamenei, said in a separate statement that the regime is using executions “as a tool of suppression and to cover up political, economic and social challenges and crises.” 

Friday’s executions also sparked outrage among Western governments and people around the world.