Iran International
Iran has sentenced a protester turned rebel to death for the killing of a nine-year-old during unrest in November, although the victim’s family insists he is innocent.
The judiciary’s news website, Mizan, said Friday Abbas (Mojahed) Kourkour has been sentenced to death for the killing of Kian Pourfalk in Izeh in southwestern Iran on November 15, adding that the sentence could be appealed.
Kian and his family were targeted by plainclothesmen during a night of protests in Izeh while they were in their car. Kian’s father was also paralyzed as a result of serious injuries he sustained during the attack.
His mother, Zaynab Molaei-Rad, who was also in the car, has always insisted that it was plainclothes agents, not Kourkour and his friends, who sprayed their car with bullets and killed her son.
A former lawmaker from Izeh, Hojjatollah Darvishpour, confirmed the account Kian’s mother gave at her son’s funeral and said she had provided all the details about those who shot and moved her son and husband to the Red Crescent and then hospital.
Belgian politician Tomas Roggerman has accepted political sponsorship of Kourkour.
Kourkour’s family also insist that he was not anywhere near the site of the shooting and was tortured into “confessing” to the shooting in which Kian was killed. His mother, Golanbar Kourkour, has appealed to Iranians to help prevent his son from being innocently executed.
Six others including three other children, were also shot dead in Izeh during the same night but authorities claim the attacks were perpetrated by “terrorists” who wanted to discredit the regime.
Shocked by the indiscriminate killing of children including Kian during nationwide protests that began in mid-September many Iranians began to call the Islamic Republic a “child-murderer regime”. Tens of other children, including a two-year-old, were killed by security forces during the protests.
Kourkour’s mother appealing to Iranians to save his son’s life.
Kourkour and three other men, their families claim, armed themselves to take revenge on the government for the killings of November 25 in Izeh and hid in a village near the city but were ambushed by security forces four days later.
During an hours-long standoff in which security forces used heavy machine guns and anti-tank grenade launchers, two members of the group were killed and Kourkour and another man were arrested.
Over 500 protesters and bystanders were killed by security forces during the protests across Iran. Authorities have only taken responsibility for the killing of one protester, the 27-year-old Mehran Sammak, who was shot by a senior police officer in his car in northern Iran on November 29.
The regime executed four young men for their alleged role in the killings of government agents in December and January after hasty trials.
Kian’s mother with the mother of the man she says is wrongfully accused of killing her son.
The accused were not allowed to have access to defense lawyers before and during their trials. Many believe that protesters’ death sentences were based on “torture-tainted confessions”. Several other protesters have been sentenced to death in similar circumstances.
Death sentences based on torture-tainted confessions of the accused are not uncommon. Iran International has learned that currently two men, 19-year-old Farhad Beigi Garousi and 34-year-old Gholamreza Rasaei, have been tortured to confess to the killing of an intelligence official in Sahneh in Kermanshah Province in western Iran on November 18.
Locals say the officer Nader Beyrami was killed in a clash with mourners when he and his forces raided a funeral ceremony for a local poet and musician to prevent the ceremony from turning into anti-government protests.
Rasaei’s family say they have witnesses who will testify that he had not been present at the scene of the killing.
The deceased and both accused belong to the Yarsan religion which has many followers among the Kurdish population of the region. Many Yarsanis hide their religion for the fear of persecution.
According to the sources, the attacks on March 30 and 31 hit intelligence centers operated by Iran and Lebanese militant outfit Hezbollah in cooperation with the Syrian government forces in the al-Mazzah municipal district in the capital Damascus and the attack on April 4 targeted Al-Qusayr airport near the Lebanese border.
Vowing revenge, the Islamic Republic has admitted that two IRGC “military advisors” -- namely Meqdad Meqdani (Meghdad Meghdani) and Milad Haydari – were killed in the late March attacks. According to the sources, the attacks seemed to be Israel's response to a foiled terrorist attack a week ago in the Megiddo area inside Israel by a person who, according to Israel, was sent by Lebanon's Hezbollah.
The sources added that both Meqdani and Haydari were IRGC intelligence officers in Syria, noting that a group of senior members of the IRGC Intelligence Organization, including former head of the body Hossein Taeb, visited the bereaved families of the two “martyrs” in the past few days.
Iran usually does not report the extent of its casualties in Syria and some observers say that acknowledging the deaths of two IRGC personnel can mean that Tehran wanted to lay the ground for retaliation. Iran International sources are of the opinion that the IRGC forces are planning an imminent attack inside Israel with the help of Hezbollah forces.
On Thursday, dozens of rockets were fired into Israeli territory from Hezbollah-controlled southern Lebanon, where several displacement camps hosting Palestinian refugees and armed factions are located.
According to Israeli-based news channel i24NEWS, Hezbollah has told Lebanese media that Palestinian groups were behind the rocket attacks.
Three security sources also told Reuters that Palestinian factions based in Lebanon were behind the rocket attacks on Thursday afternoon across the disputed border into Israel.
The Israeli military is still assessing the situation following Thursday's rocket strikes from Lebanon but is working on the assumption that Palestinian factions were behind the attacks, a defense official said. The Israeli military said 34 rockets were launched from Lebanon on Thursday, of which 25 were intercepted by its Iron Dome anti-missile system.
In response to the volley of rockets fired from Lebanon, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu promised to hit back hard, saying "As for the aggression aimed at us from other fronts - we will hit our enemies and they will pay a price for every act of aggression." Hours after his threat, powerful Israeli airstrikes rocked Gaza strip after midnight on Friday.
Iran has considerable drone capabilities that it has used against US bases in Syria as recently as last month, killing a US contractor and injuring at least eight US servicemen.
Tensions rose in Syria when on March 23 Iranian backed forces attacked a US base with a drone, inflicting casualties. The US responded with an air strike, which was followed by more attacks on US forces. The tit-for-tat strikes stopped after two days, but Iran has targeted US forces in Iraq and Syria 80 times since early 2021 when the Biden administration assumed office.
Israel has been regularly attacking targets in Syria since 2017 to weaken Iran's attempts to strengthen its military presence in the war-torn country and build up a threat on Israel's northern borders.
The pundits, who felt they could express their views in the local media, also supported an interim agreement with the United States which they said could be a positive achievement for Iran.
Former diplomat Ali Majedi advised the government in a commentary in Etemad daily, "not to be afraid of negotiations as Iran's foreign policy needs a serious development." He added that an interim agreement could be a prelude to returning to the 2015 Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA).
The idea of an interim agreement is a suggestion made by the United States which says it is currently not planning to return to the JCPOA, wrote Etemad.
Majedi said that a change in foreign policy has started with an agreement with Saudi Arabia to resume diplomatic ties after seven years of tensions. Majedi added that Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei's remark about Iran not holding a grudge against Europe in his Iranian New Year address could be a green light to Iranian diplomats to start settle the differences over the JCPOA.
However, Khamenei later said in an early April speech that Iran should look for partners other than the United States and Europe.
Majedi, however, was not sure about the nature of an interim agreement and "what it means? Whether it is for six months or longer? Whether it can be extended?" Iran has previously dismissed an interim agreement emphasizing that it accepts nothing other than the 2015 agreement.
Majedi reiterated that if Iran can return to the agreement with the West and have the sanctions lifted, it would help its ailing economy. He added that "For its own interests, Iran's leaders should trust their negotiators no matter if the talks can or cannot be fruitful."
Meanwhile, another former diplomat , Abdolreza Faraji Rad suggested that "Iran and the United States had better start confidential negotiations," adding that "they might be able to reach an agreement if they talk face-to-face." The latest rounds of negotiations between Iran and the United States were indirect talks with European mediation, but the talks were suspended after Russia invaded Ukraine and Khamenei explicitly supported Russia and later Iran sent drones to be used against Ukraine.
Faraji Rad added that the idea of an interim agreement and a new round of talks with the United States was put forward months before US media broke the news.
Taking the lead in the opposition to an interim government was IRGC-linked newspaper Javan which has always opposed any negotiations with America.
He said the United States and Europe are still not interested in renewed talks with Iran, but they have been mulling the idea of new negotiations in a bid to dissuade Iran from supporting Russia in the war against Ukraine. They believe winning Iran's heart with a Plan B including lifting some of the sanctions and allowing more oil exports could entice Iran to stop uranium enrichment at 60-percent level.
In another development, media commentator Hassan Beheshtipour said, "an interim agreement can be a temporary solution as a long-term agreement is impossible without holding negotiations with the United States."
Beheshtipour, however, maintained that "an interim agreement cannot solve Iran's economic problem." He added that the most Iran can win in such an interim government is releasing its $7 billion frozen assets in South Korea.
He said, "Iran should nonetheless welcome the agreement if it helps solve its economic crisis. Otherwise, if Iran thinks it won’t face a major economic issue in the next four or five years, it can always wait for a more comprehensive agreement and a better solution."
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