Iranians Abroad Hold Rallies To Condemn Brutalities Of Regime

The European Union in a statement Saturday condemned the execution of Mohammad Mehdi Karami and Seyyed Mohammad Hosseini in Iran and called the executions “yet another sign of the Iranian authorities’ violent repression of civilian demonstrations” and urged Iranian government to “strictly abide by their obligations enshrined in the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights” to which Iran is a party.

“The European Union calls once again on the Iranian authorities to immediately end the strongly condemnable practice of imposing and carrying out death sentences against protesters,” the EU said and called on Tehran to “annul without delay the recent death penalty sentences that were already pronounced in the context of the ongoing protests and to provide due process to all detainees.”

Condemning the executions and calling them “abhorrent”, British foreign minister James Cleverly urged the Islamic Republic to "immediately end the violence against its own people". "The UK is strongly opposed to the death penalty in all circumstances," Cleverly said.

US Special Envoy for Iran Rob Malley tweeted, “Appalled by the regime’s execution of two more young Iranians after sham trials. These executions must stop. We and others across the globe will continue to hold Iran’s leadership accountable.”

French senators have tabled a resolution calling on the EU for ending nuclear negotiations with Iran and designating the Revolutionary Guards (IRGC) as a terrorist organization.

“Over 40 senators have supported the motion that requires the European Union to end the talks to restore the 2015 nuclear deal (JCPOA), list the IRGC as a terrorist organization, and shut down Iranian banks in the EU countries and close its airspace to Iranian flights for fundamental human rights violations,” Senator Nathalie Goulet who proposed the motion with her colleagues in the upper house of the French Parliament told Iran International.

The European affairs committee of the Senate will be working on this resolution over the next ten days, she added.

The resolution calls on the Government and the European Union to “consolidate and extend the limitation of access to the primary and secondary capital markets of the Union for Iranian banks, including those established on the territory of the European Union.”

It also calls on the European Union to expel students in the EU who have a family link with Iranian officials on the list of Persons Subject to Restrictive Measures for Serious Human Rights Violations in Iran.

Other European lawmakers, some of whom have accepted the political sponsorship of some of several detained Iranian protesters including those with a death penalty hanging over their heads strongly condemned Saturday’s hangings of, Karami and Hosseini, urging their governments to adopt restrictive measures against Iran for its violation of human rights.

Helge Limburg, the German lawmaker who accepted Karami’s political sponsorship in a tweet said he could not express his deep “sadness and rage” over his execution while French lawmaker Clementine Autain who also sponsored Karami in a tweet strongly criticized the French President Emanuel Macron for his “silence vis-à-vis the [Islamic Republic] regime.”

Norbert Röttgen, member of the German Parliament (Bundestag) in a tweet after the executions said Germany and the EU must “finally start taking decisive action to protect the 19k other prisoners” while another German MP, Hannah Neumann, in a tweet said the regime “will not stop with more talks and red carpets”. “We need to send a clear signal and treat them as what they are: terrorists,” she added.

The Oslo-based Iran Human Rights Organization called the execution of Mohammad Mehdi Karami, 22, and Mohammad Hosseini, 39 was a "criminal act" and warned of "massive executions of protesters" if there is no "adequate response from the international community".

Both men were arrested for the killing of a Basij militiaman named Ruhollah Ajamian during the protests on November 3 in Karaj west of Tehran.

Canada-based activist Hamed Esmaeilion said in a tweet Saturday that “terrorists of the Islamic Republic murdered two innocent young men without access to the lawyers and behind closed doors. The time has come to expel their ambassadors.”

British-Iranian actress and human rights activist Nazanin Boniadi also condemned the executions saying, “Shame on the global community and leaders for not stopping the Islamic Republic’s atrocities.”

Masih Alinejad, another rights activist, also said in a tweet, "In our occupied land, our loved ones are being executed for chanting for freedom, for protesting against poverty, corruption and brutality."

Two protestors named Mohsen Shekari and Majidreza Rahnavard were executed in Tehran and Mashhad in December.

Following mass arrests of protestors in the last four months and hasty death sentences issued for 11 people in sham trials, human rights activists and some foreign officials have been calling for weeks to hold the Islamic Republic accountable.

In this video, which was released on Friday, they said "We stand with the people of Iran in their fight for freedom. Thousands of protesters have been arrested. Some have already been executed. Many more are in danger, but the world is watching."

Just one day after the message by Hollywood stars, the clerical regime executed two more protesters Saturday morning, bringing the total to four in one month. Mohammad Mehdi Karami and Mohammad Hosseini were hanged amid international outcry against regime’s brutality. Mohsen Shekari and Majidreza Rahnavard had been hanged earlier.

This video messagewas produced in collaboration with Iranian-American screenwriter Nicole Najafi.

Najafi wrote on her Instagram that execution of protesters is the regime’s “last ditch effort to save themselves and terrorize their own people into submission. But Iranians will not back down.”

The Oslo-based Iran Human Rights Organization says at least 100 of the arrested protesters are at risk of receiving death penalty or being executed.

Since September 16 and following the death of Mahsa Amini in the custody of Tehran's morality police, Iran has been the scene of widespread protests, which have been met with violent repression by the Islamic Republic's security forces.

The execution of four Iranian protesters took place following hasty trials and without observing due process, which has provoked public anger in Iran and has been condemned by many around the world.

"Mohammad Mehdi Karami and Seyyed Mohammad Hosseini, main perpetrators of the crime that led to the unjust martyrdom of Ruhollah Ajamian were hanged this morning," the judiciary said in a statement carried by the official IRNA news agency.

Karami was 22 years old, and Hosseini 39 were tried without having access to attorneys of their choosing, as almost all other dissidents and protesters arrested during the demonstrations. The circumstances related to the killing of Ajamian are not clear, as often the Basij paramilitary forces take the lead to attack protesters and use deadly force.

The convictions were not based on a criminal charge related to the murder per se, but they were charged with ‘moharebeh’, meaning “war against God”, a vague religious concept. The Islamic Republic applies the charge to people who might get into a confrontation with security forces during protests.

“I met with Seyed-Mohammad Hosseini at Karaj Prison. He cried through his account of tortures, being beaten with tied hands and legs and blindfolded, to being kicked in the head and losing consciousness, the soles of his feet being beaten with an iron rod to being tased in different parts of the body,” Ali Sharifzadeh Ardakani who says he has just recently been allowed to represent Hosseini tweeted on December 18.

Despite widespread international attempts to stop the executions, the regime decided to implement the verdict reached in November. Officials say death sentences for three others in the same case have been canceled.

So far, the government has executed four protesters and eleven others have received the death penalty, some for much less charges than murder, while at least 100 protesters face charges that could end in death sentences for them, an Iranian human rights group based in Oslo has reported.

The first two hangings triggered strong international condemnations and hundreds of lawmakers in Europe and Australia began sponsoring Iranian detainees in danger of execution to generate publicity and impact their fate.

French lawmaker Aude Luquet had taken on Hosseini’s political sponsorship and called for an immediate halt to all executions in Iran. Hosseini is also sponsored by Austrian parliamentarian Harold Truch.

Mohammad-Mehdi Karami was sponsored by Helge Limburg, member of the German parliament. “The regime in Iran assumes that he was involved in a killing. In truth he should die because he stands up for democracy and human rights. His execution would be a judicial killing,” Limburg tweeted December 12.

Activists had earlier called for protests in Iran and abroad on Sunday, January 8, the third anniversary of the downing of a Ukrainian airliner over Tehran by the Revolutionary Guard that killed all 176 people onboard. The executions on Saturday will add fuel to people's anger and big protests can take place as early as today.

Dozens of prisoners are either on hunger strike or suffer from life-threatening illnesses that are not treated by prison authorities and some are deprived of life-saving medications.

In the audio file published by the VOA Farsi service on Thursday, a security agent of the Islamic Republic, who introduces himself as an agent of the intelligence ministry, threatens "Massi Kamri", an Iranian activist living in France, saying if she does not stop acting against the regime, they will imprison her parents and family members in Iran.

Apparently, she participated in rallies against the Islamic Republic’s bloody crackdown on antigovernment protests that have engulfed Iran following the death in custody of 22-year-old Mahsa Amini. 

Using an insulting tone, the agent tells Kamri if she cares about her family and does not want them to be taken to the notorious Evin prison in Tehran she should not engage in anti-Islamic Republic activities.

The agent also says she must stop sharing Instagram stories and posts that encourage people in Iran to chant slogans and hold protests.

In another part of the recording, Kamri says her Instagram page is private and no one except her followers could see her posts, but the person from the intelligence ministry claims he has access to her page, saying “it’s right now open in front of me!”

Kamri insists that she has not done anything wrong according to the laws of France, where she is a permanent resident, but the agent says what she is doing is against the Islamic Republic. She told the regime’s agent that nowhere in the world do authorities hold accountable the family members of someone who commits a crime, but the agent replied this is Iran and they can do whatever they like. 

This is not the first time Iranian agents threaten people living abroad for expressing their opinions. The Daily Telegraph recently reported that the Islamic Republic uses mosques and political institutions in the United Kingdom as part of its “spying system” to target dissidents.

Canada's spy agency also launched an investigation into what it calls multiple "credible" death threats from Iran aimed at individuals in Canada.

In November, Israel’s Mossad informed Britain’s spy agency about an impending Iranian plot to carry out terrorist attacks against Iran International’s journalists based in London. 

According to information obtained by Iran International, threats against its journalists came from the same team that sought to target Israel’s former consul general in Istanbul, Yosef Levi Sfari, who was rescued by authorities and sent back to Israel.

Faced with nationwide antigovernment protests since mid-September, the Islamic Republic has blamed foreign-based Persian broadcasters such as BBC Persian and Iran International of “fomenting unrest”, while all media in the country are under tight government control and present protesters as “rioters” and “terrorists”. The Islamic Republic is notorious for tormenting the families of dissidents in every way it can think of, from abducting the bodies of the dead ones and burying them in undisclosed locations -- such as the case of late journalist Reza Haqiqatnejad -- to detaining and calling in family members for interrogations to warn them of talking to media about their loved ones. 

Iran’s Intelligence Minister Esmail Khatib on November 9 said the Islamic Republic regards Iran International as “a terrorist organization,” adding that its workers and anyone affiliated with the channel will be pursued by the Ministry of Intelligence.

Iran has a long record of targeting dissidents and independent journalists who found refuge in other countries. In the latest example of terror operations abroad, Iranian intelligence abducted dissident journalist Ruhollah Zam who was visiting Iraq in 2019 and took him back to Iran where he was executed in 2020.