Dr. Khaled M. Batarfi
IRAN has executed 20 Sunni scholars in one day. According to Zeid Ra’ad Al Hussein, UN High Commissioner for human rights, the trials were not fair, with no respect to due process, which points out a case of clear injustice.
He added that the legal proceedings were marred with vague and loose charges against members of a certain ethnic group (the Kurds) and disrespect for the rights of the accused. Some of them, like Shahram Ahmadi, was forced under torture to sign a blank document that later was filled, without his consent, with confessions of terrorist acts.
Over one thousand people, including women and children, were hanged last year, putting Iran, with China, at the top of the world’s worst executioners. This is an average of some three cases a day — a world record, according to a report issued by the United Nations.
The 25-page report noted the rise in executions in the Islamic Republic of Iran during 2015 — the pace and shape of which was unprecedented in the past 25 years.
There were about 700 people on death row, during the first six months of last year alone, while the total number in 2014 amounted to 753, an increase of nearly 40 percent.
The UN said that the reasons for the recent increase in executions are unclear, and that “the widespread use by the Iranian authorities of the death penalty is a clear violation of international law.” Most executed were members of ethnic and religious minorities who have been convicted on charges of “anti-God” or “spreading corruption on earth.” They included politicians, journalists, as well as, Arabs, Kurds, Baluch, Turks and other Sunni Muslims.
The UN report noted that cases of executions have increased since (so-called moderate) President Hassan Rouhani won the presidential race in 2013. Under his watch, over 1,900 people were killed, so far. That is much more than people killed under the previous ultra-orthodox government of Mahmoud Ahmadinejad.
In Dec. 24, 2015, Iran’s Supreme Court has ratified death sentences of Sunni Muslims for “propaganda against the regime” despite not committing any crimes of violence or incitement to murder.
Now, compare these cases to executions of terrorists in Saudi Arabia. Here, they chose their lawyers, and went through three levels of trials.
Relatives, journalists, human rights organizations and concerned groups and individuals were in attendance.
When one of those terrorists, Nimr Al-Nimr, was found guilty and executed earlier this year, Iranians went bananas. The Supreme Leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamaeni, President Hassan Rouhani, his ministers and generals, down to Iran’s agents of terror in the region, like Hezbollah’s Hasan Nasraallah, protested, damned and threatened Saudi Arabia.
These high-voltage enticements led to Shiite demonstrations in Lebanon, Iraq and Pakistan. In Iran, it went further, as protesters attacked, burned and looted the Saudi Embassy in Tehran and Consulate in Mashhad, under the lenient watch of Iranian security forces.
Later on, 48 participants were accused, 21 called to court, but only 14 went to trials. At the end, all were forgiven, because “they were following calls from the Revolutionary Guard, and the police were there and had not interfered, which makes the actions look legitimate.” And ultimately, “because Saudi Arabia deserves it!” So much so for justice and respect for international law and protection of foreign diplomatic missions. Silence is complacency. The world should not tolerate Iran’s crimes anymore, any longer. In Iraq, Syria, Lebanon, Yemen and its own country, the sectarian regime is spreading hate, war and destruction.
Its terrorists, militias and Revolutionary Guard are terrorizing and corrupting our world. Drugs, mercenaries, money laundering, arms trade are financing its mafias. With such reckless gangster policies, no one is safe. Its criminal global network is reaching to faraway places, from Argentina and Panama to Singapore and Pakistan, and from Germany and the Netherlands to Senegal and Nigeria.
Barack Obama may think he could buy peace with Iran by paying hefty ransoms (like the $400 million he shipped in cash in airborne boxes to release few American hostages), but he is very wrong. The US president is forgetting that if you gave a mouse a cookie, he would ask for milk. Bribing hijackers hasn’t been outlawed for no good reason. Wasn’t IranContra enough of a lesson?
History would punish those who don’t learn from past mistakes. And, mark my words, appeasers would be punished by the appeased … soon enough!
— Dr. Khaled M. Batarfi is a Saudi writer based in Jeddah. He can be reached at kbatarfi@gmail.com. Follow him at Twitter:@kbatarfi
