Human rights group pulls alarm on 20 imminent executions

Shirin Alam Huli

International Campaign for Human Rights in Iran issued a statement raising concern that 20 Kurdish Iranian political prisoners are in imminent “danger of execution.”

Hadi Ghaemi, spokesman for the Campaign announced: “The judiciary is speeding up its process to finalize a wave of executions for political prisoners, especially for Kurdish activists.” He adds that the sentences are “politically charged” and not based on fair legal procedures.

In the past months, two Iranian Kurdish activists, Ehsan Fatahian and Fasih Yasamani, were executed in Iran. Shirin Alam Huli is a 28-year-old Kurdish woman who has recently been handed the death penalty.

Kurdistan Human Rights Organization reports that she was put on trial on December 19 and within two weeks, her death sentence was issued. She is charged with “moharebeh (enmity with God) through collaboration with the armed opposition forces of Kurdistan.”

Ms. Huli was arrested in May of 2009 by the Revolutionary Guards of Iran. After 21 days in the Revolutionary Guards detention centre and five months in Evin prison solitary, she was transferred to the general section of Evin prison.

Her lawyer reports that she was subjected to beatings and “severe torture” while she was in custody of the Revolutionary Guards. He also expressed surprise over the issued death sentence which he claims does not follow from the evidence presented in court.

Another 17 Iranian Kurdish prisoners are in imminent danger of executions. According to the International Campaign for Human Rights two political activists in Ouromieh have also been given the death sentence by an appeals court which trumped up their sentences from twenty years in prison to execution.

The Campaign calls on the United Nations Human Rights Commission to confront the actions of the Islamic Republic before another “human rights catastrophe” takes place.