Don’t Let Us Die, Plead ‘Esfahan House’ Prisoners Facing Execution
Three political prisoners on death row in Iran have written from jail urging the people to stop their execution.
Three political prisoners on death row in Iran have written from jail urging the people to stop their execution.
Saeed Yaqoubi, Saleh Mirhashmi and Majid Kazemi, were convicted over the death of two IRGC’s Basij militia members and a police officer in protests of November last year, in what Persian media have dubbed the ‘Esfahan (Esfahan) House’ case.
Describing themselves as "children of Iran" in the letter, the three prisoners said: "Hello. We ask our dear fellow citizens not to let them kill us. We need your help. We need your support."
Amir Kazemi, Majid's cousin, verified the authenticity of the hand-written letter in an interview with Prague-based Farsi language Radiofarda.
After authorities released videos of three protesters confessing to the killing of three security officers their families expressed concern about their imminent execution.
On Sunday night and again on Wednesday night, people gathered outside Esfahan (Isfahan) Central Prison hoping to stop the feared hangings.
Videos posted by activists show dozens chanting slogans in front of the prison, while gunfire was also heard as thick smoke caused by teargas enveloped the area.
Opposition activists say the death penalty is being used against the Isfahan House three as an intimidation tactic to stop further protests.
Campaigners say the prisoners were tortured into confessions, and there is no reliable evidence against them.
Earlier in the day, Diana Eltahawy, Amnesty International’s Deputy Director for the Middle East and North Africa, called on the international community to take bold action to prevent the execution of the three protesters who were tortured into confessing.
“The shocking manner in which the trial and sentencing of these protesters was fast-tracked through Iran’s judicial system amid the use of torture-tainted ‘confessions’, serious procedural flaws and a lack of evidence is another example of the Iranian authorities’ brazen disregard for the rights to life and fair trial,” she said.
Majid Kazemi said in an audio recording from prison that he was forced to make false self-incriminating statements after interrogators beat him, gave him electric shocks, subjected him to mock executions, and threatened to rape him, execute his brothers and harass his parents.
Iranian expatriate communities plan demonstrations against the executions in cities worldwide on Saturday, May 20.
In a separate development, Iran International has learned that hearings were held for seven people detained during the ‘Women, Life, Liberty’ protests at the Revolutionary and Criminal Courts of Tabriz in the past few days. They were arrested in the city in September and November last year during protests following the death in custody of 22-year-old Mahsa Amini.
The seven -- identified as Pejman Eslami (31), Baqer Taji Ahmadifard (35), Mehdi (Safa) Fanai(41), Alireza Shirdel(33), Amir Ahmadian (21), Anoush Adami (34) and Omid Abdollah-Beigi (35) -- were charged with various crimes such as ‘Moharebeh’ that can lead to a death sentence.
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.
According to unconfirmed reports, at least 10 underage protesters are also facing death sentences for the “moharebeh” and “corruption on earth”.
Nationwide protests that erupted after the death of Kurdish Iranian Mahsa Amini on September 16, posed the biggest internal challenge to the Islamic Republic since its establishment in 1979. 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.
Information obtained by Iran International shows how Naji Sharifi-Zindashti and his cartel now dominate the narcotics trade thanks to the support of the government militia.
His extraordinary rise comes despite his having killed a prison guard in Iran and fleeing abroad, only to return with impunity.
Investigative reporter Mojtaba Pourmohsen has uncovered how a recent rise in the number of executions of convicts sentenced to death on drug-related charges is the result of infighting between rival drug cartels with connections within the ranks of the IRGC.
Emerging triumphant from this criminal war, Sharifi-Zindashti and his accomplices – dubbed “The Friends’ Club” – have used the IRGC’s vast reach and control over transit routes and logistics to gain the upper hand in Iran's drug market, according to sources.
The Club comprises senior IRGC officials and high-ranking members of Iran’s Supreme National Security Council as well as managers from Tehran Municipality and members of parliament.
Sharifi-Zindashti not only pays bribes but also supplies opium and heroin for the personal consumption of many of these senior officials.
According to the sources, Sharifi-Zindashti’s gangs traffic more than 20 percent of drugs distributed across Iran and about 35 percent of the drugs pushed in the capital Tehran.
The narcotics that are confiscated and destroyed as part of the Islamic Republic’s regular war on drugs mostly belong to rival gangs.
Iranian police arrested Zindashti in 1996 for a drug deal. Sentenced to death on drug-related charges, Zindashti along with an accomplice killed a guard during transfer to the court to testify in another case. Zindashti fled to Turkey, where he established a drug and human trafficking cartel.
He has since been cooperating with the Islamic Republic’s intelligence agencies in numerous cases, including the abduction in 2020 of Swedish-Iranian Habib Chaab (Asyud), a political activist and former leader of the Arab Struggle Movement for the Liberation of Ahwaz (ASMLA) who was executed earlier in the month.
In December 2020, the Turkish Police arrested 13 members of the Zindashti Cartel on charges of collaboration with Iranian intelligence. According to Turkey's official government news agency, Anatoli, the Iranian Intelligence Ministry had been using the gang to assassinate or abduct Iranian dissidents in Turkey at least since 2015.
Zindashti is also suspected to have been behind the assassination of Iranian dissident Masoud Molavi Vardanjani in Istanbul in November 2019. Molavi-Vardanjani, a former Iranian intelligence operative and a civil engineer by education, fled to Turkey in 2018 and launched a Telegram channel, called Black Box, focused on corruption allegations against Iran’s extraterritorial Qods Force, top officials in the office of Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei, judges and other senior figures.
In 2018 some of the members of the group and Zindashti himself were arrested in Turkey on suspicion of assassinating Saeed Karimian, the founder and head of Gem TV, and other killings related to drug trafficking. They were eventually freed, reportedly as a result of lobbying, bribery and lack of adequate evidence.
After his release Zindashti returned to Iran and despite his convictions for drug trafficking and the killing of a prison guard in the past, Zindashti leads a free life in Iran. In December 2022, he was honored during a ceremony by Iran’s Education Ministry as one of the members of the Charity for School Constructions. He is a benefactor and CEO of Zindashti Star Charitable Institute, constructing shopping malls and schools, yet also a drug lord with links to regime insiders.
“Based on what I heard during the last 40 minutes they really don't have much to say on the topic, and I didn't think it was particularly useful briefing. I don't know if they really have a coherent strategy if there is one I didn't I didn't hear,” Sen. Josh Hawley a staunch Republican critic of the Biden administration said in response to our correspondent Arash Alaei.
US senators on Tuesday heard a confidential briefing on Iran by Biden administration officials eight months after long nuclear talks with Tehran reached an impasse last September and Iran continued its uranium enrichment, building up its stockpile of fissile material.
Sen. Hawley added that in his view there was no need to classify the briefing as ‘confidential’ and the senators were not given any new information. “We didn't learn anything new or remotely classified.”
Senator Jim Risch (R-Idaho) released a brief statement saying that after six months since President Joe Biden declared the 2015 nuclear accord, the JCPOA “dead” the US “is no closer to a more comprehensive Iran policy. Strategic ambiguity on Iran policy only serves to embolden the regime and push our partners closer to China.”
President Biden was heard saying in November 2020 that the JCPOA is dead, but the administration has continued to emphasize its commitment to a diplomatic solution.
After nuclear talks with Iran hit a dead-end last year, senior US officials have repeatedly said that they are no longer focused on the JCPOA.
Sen. Risch went on to say that “As Iran continues to illegally seize vessels, target Americans in the region, and support its terror proxies and the Russian invasion of Ukraine, Americans deserve a policy that is more than a failed nuclear negotiation.”
Republican senator from Lousiana, John Kennedy, told reporters that he believes China, Russia and the Islamic Republic are coordinating efforts to dominate the Indo-Pacific, Central and Eastern Europe and the Middle East respectively.
“That is not a world that is safe for the US,” he said, and added, “We are in a bar fight with Putin, with Xi, with the Ayatollah,” and the Biden administration “believes in peace, but they believe in peace for weakness.”
Senator Kennedy also echoed Sen. Risch’s comment about the administration not having an effective policy. Sanctions have been imposed on Iran and Russia, but “when you ask the administration, what is your plan given that the sanctions have not stopped them, or what is your plan in addition to the sanctions, you are met with either silence or BS or both.”
The senator was also clear about what he expects from a possible nuclear deal with the Islamic Republic. “The deal I want is for Iran to give up all of its fissile materials, all of it, and give up its capability of making a nuclear bomb and to allow international inspectors to check them every other day. Otherwise, they probably won't have any deal.”
Senator Rick Scott (Rep-Fl) in response to questions expressed deep concern about Iran’s role in the region and in helping Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.
“I don't think you can say there's anything good happening out of Iran.”