According to the NGO Hrana, some 19,600 people have been detained since the outbreak of the riots.
Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei has accepted a proposal from that country’s judiciary to “pardon or reduce the sentence of a significant number” of those accused and convicted of participating in the protests that have been unleashed following the death in custody last year of the young Kurdish-Iranian Mahsa Amini. The woman died under unclear circumstances after being arrested on September 13, 2022 for wearing her hijab improperly.
As the official Iranian news agency IRNA reported on Sunday, the amnesty will be granted on the upcoming commemoration of the 44th anniversary of the Islamic revolution, on February 11, 1979. The historic uprising marked the end of the Pahlavi dynasty by the front of the country was led by Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini, whose successor Ali Khamenei has been supreme leader since 1989.
As detailed by the Iranian media, the proposed parole is in line with Article 110 of Iran’s constitution, which “confers on the leader the right to pardon or reduce the sentences of those convicted upon the recommendation of the head of the judiciary.” However, the amnesty is subject to various conditions and not all convicts or accused persons will be able to benefit from it. Initially, it would not apply to any of the many detained citizens with dual citizenship. Nor would it reach those accused of “espionage for foreign agencies” or “affiliation with groups hostile to the Islamic Republic”.
In accordance with the terms set by the judiciary, accused and convicts who “have not committed espionage, willful homicide or injury, or destruction of public property” would deserve this amnesty. Nor will a pardon be granted to those who do not “regret their activities and undertake in writing not to repeat them”.
Khamenei thus accepts the proposal of the head of the Iranian judiciary, Gholamhosein Mohseni Ejei, who explained to him in writing that “a remarkable number of these prisoners have repented of their crimes and have apologized after the revelation of the plots hatched by foreign enemies and anti-revolutionary and anti-popular currents.” While the Iranian government has acknowledged occasional excesses in the harsh repression of the protests, the Iranian government has consistently blamed the demonstrations on the intervention of “rioters”, many of them paid by “foreign powers”.
The protests have so far resulted in between 481 and 522 deaths, including 68 members of the country’s security forces, according to NGOs specializing in monitoring the crisis. According to the NGO Hrana, up to 19,600 people have been detained since the protests broke out, of which 713 have already been sentenced by an Iranian court.
Human rights groups say that among the nearly 500 killed in the crackdown, 70 are minors. At least four people have been hanged and 109 people are threatened with the possibility of being hanged, according to Iranian justice. in fact, the country’s authorities have indicated that protests have subsided significantly since the execution of the death sentences. For its part, Amnesty International has criticized the Iranian authorities for what it describes as “sham trials designed to intimidate those participating in the popular uprising that has devastated Iran”.
In any case, the Iranian government hopes that this pardon will reach “tens of thousands of convicts”, including the participants in the demonstrations, although the exact number that could meet all the above criteria is unknown.
For his part, one of Iran’s main opponents, Mir Hosein Mousavi, is calling for a “fundamental change” in the country’s political system, which is facing a “legitimacy crisis” with the protest movement over the death of Mahsa Amini. . “Iran and the Iranians need and are ready for a fundamental change, the guidelines of which are set by the pure Women-Life-Freedom movement,” Mousavi said in a statement on his website that was shared by local media on Sunday. picked up.
Mousavi, 80 and a losing candidate in the 2009 presidential election, has been under house arrest in Tehran with his wife Zahra Rahnavard for 12 years but has not been charged. The opponent proposes to hold a “free and fair referendum on whether or not to write a new constitution”, because the current “structure” of the system is “unsustainable”.
Source: La Verdad
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