Prisoner is publicly hanged after protest arrest, Iran says
Iran executed a second prisoner on Monday convicted over crimes committed during the nationwide protests challenging the country’s theocracy, publicly hanging him from a construction crane as a gruesome warning to others.
The execution of Majidreza Rahnavard came less than a month after he allegedly fatally stabbed two members of a paramilitary force after purportedly becoming angry about security forces killing protesters.
The development underscores the speed at which Iran now carries out death sentences handed down for those detained in the demonstrations that the government hopes to put down.
Activists warn that at least a dozen people already have been sentenced to death in closed-door hearings. At least 488 people have been killed since the demonstrations began in mid-September, according to Human Rights Activists in Iran, a group that’s been monitoring the protests. Another 18,200 people have been detained by authorities.
Iran’s Mizan news agency, which falls under the country’s judiciary, published a collage of images of Rahnavard hanging from the crane, his hands and feet bound, a black bag over his head.
Masked security-force members stood guard in front of concrete and metal barriers that held back a gathered crowd Monday morning in the Iranian city of Mashhad.
Mizan alleged Rahnavard had stabbed two securityforce members to death on Nov. 17 in Mashhad and wounded four others.
Footage aired on state TV showed a man chasing another around a street corner, then standing over him and stabbing him after he fell against a parked motorbike. Another showed the same man stabbing another immediately after. The assailant, which state TV alleged was Rahnavard, then fled.
The Mizan report identified the dead as “student” Basij, paramilitary volunteers under Iran’s Revolutionary Guard. The Basij have deployed in major cities, attacking and detaining protesters, who in many cases have fought back.
A heavily edited state television report aired after Rahnavard’s execution showed clips of him in the courtroom. In the video, he says he came to hate the Basijis after seeing video clips on social media of the forces beating and killing protesters.
The Mizan report accused Rahnavard of trying to flee to a foreign country when he was arrested.
Mashhad, a Shiite holy city, is located some 460 miles east of the Iranian capital, Tehran. Activists say it has seen strikes, shops closed and demonstrations amid the unrest that began over the Sept. 16 death in custody of Mahsa Amini, a 22-year-old woman who had been detained by Iran’s morality police.
Mizan said Rahnavard was convicted in Mashhad’s Revolutionary Court. The tribunals have been internationally criticized for not allowing those on trial to pick their own lawyers or even see the evidence against them.
Rahnavard had been convicted on the charge of “moharebeh,” a Farsi word meaning “waging war against God.” That charge has been levied against others in the decades since the 1979 Islamic Revolution and carries the death penalty.
Executions conducted in public with a crane have been rare in recent years, though Iran used the same manner of hanging to put down unrest following the disputed 2009 presidential election and the Green Movement protests that followed.