As of last week four young men have been executed at the hands of the Iranian regime. They were arrested while participating in the recent protests sparked by the death in custody of Jina (Mahsa) Amini. After being tortured and forced to make confessions, they faced grossly unfair show trials. Without strong condemnation, this death toll will grow – there are many more who have currently been sentenced to execution. Here we remember those four who died fighting for freedom.
Mohammad Mehdi Karami
Mohammad Mehdi Karami was a 22-year-old Kurdish Iranian man From Karaj in the Alborz province of Iran. He was arrested on 5 November 2022 for allegedly killing a member of the security forces and was executed just two months later on 7 January. At the time of his death, he had been on hunger strike for four days, demanding access to his lawyer.
Mohammad was a national karate champion who had several national titles. In an interview with Etemad newspaper, his father describes Mohammad as “an athlete who constantly strived to achieve honours”. In the video, uploaded on 12 December, he pleads with authorities to release his son and recounts various attempts to contact the lawyer who was appointed to his son by the judiciary, all of which were ignored. He describes a phone conversation with Mohammad in which the young man sobbed and begged his father not to tell his mother about his sentence. “Mehdi’s mother is very attached to him,” he said. “If something happens to Mehdi, our lives will also end”.
"Ne le dis pas à maman". Graffiti dans un lieu inconnu, reprenant la déclaration de Mohammad Mehdi Karami à son père, au moment de sa condamnation à mort. Mohammad Mehdi Karami a été exécuté hier par le régime iranien sans avoir pu revoir ses parents pic.twitter.com/Fje0mJsnv9
Mohammad attempted to appeal his sentence but was denied. His father maintains that on their final phone call, his son swore to have not committed murder. The family was not allowed to see him to say goodbye before he was hanged. They camped outside the Rajai Shahr prison in Karaj. The prison guards reassured them that he was alive and well. They told the family that rumours of execution were false and to return home. Mohammad’s grave is in Eshtehard, Alborz. Mehdi Beyk, the journalist who interviewed Karami’s parents, was later arrested.
Seyed Mohammad Hosseini
Seyed Mohammad Hosseini, 39, was a worker remembered for volunteering with children by a German parliamentarian who advocated his case.
Hosseini was convicted for allegedly murdering a member of the security forces and was executed on 7 January. His lawyer, Ali Sharifzadeh Ardakani, described meeting him in prison: “He was in tears, talking about how he was tortured and beaten while blindfolded.” Ardakani previously revealed that the court had denied him access to case materials to defend his client during the entire interrogation and trial process.
Seyed Mohammad was an orphan with no immediate family to receive his body after his execution. His brother was also arrested but disappeared after release. Mohammad’s friends weren’t allowed to visit him in prison. He was buried near Mohammad Mehdi Karami’s grave in Eshtehard, Alborz. Mohammad Mehdi’s family attended Mohammad’s grave, lit candles and placed flowers there in his memory.
Majidreza Rahnavard
Majidreza Rahnavard was publicly executed on 12 December, just 23 days after his arrest.
He was charged with allegedly fatally stabbing two Basij militia volunteers. The 23-year-old was denied a lawyer of his choice for his trial.
The lawyer he was given did not put up a defence. Mahmood Amiry-Moghaddam, director of Norway-based Iran Human Rights, tweeted that Rahnavard was sentenced based on “coerced confessions, after a grossly unfair process and a show trial”.
Majidreza’s mother was not told about his execution until after his death. Activist collective 1500tasvir said on Twitter that the family received a telephone call from an official at 07:00 local time. They said: “We have killed your son and buried his body in Behesht-e Reza cemetery.”
In a video aired by authorities, Rahnavard appears blindfolded, surrounded by masked men. He is asked what he wrote in his will. He says: “I don’t want anyone to pray, or to cry. I want everyone to be happy and play happy music.”
They allowed #MajidRezaRahnavard’s mother to visit him, and didn’t speak of execution at all. She left smiling and hoping that her son would be released soon. This morning she arrived when her son’s murderers were burying his dead body alone.#StopExecutionInIranpic.twitter.com/9n2k02uE60
Mohsen Shekari, 23, worked in a cafe. He was arrested on 25 September for trying to stop security forces from attacking protesters in Tehran. He was the first person to be executed by the state on 8 December after being convicted of injuring a member of Iran’s Basij militia or “waging war against God”. While authorities asserted that he wielded a machete, Shekari’s family disputed this version of events, claiming he used non-violent means to separate protesters and security forces.
Mohsen Shekari. Photo: Unknown (CC BY 4.0).
Shekari’s uncle told The Guardian that authorities did not release his body. Other families of dead protesters have made similar statements. He said that the family had been sent to two cemeteries, but that when they arrived at the locations, they were told the body was not there. Although Mohsen’s mother saw her son the night before his hanging, she was ordered to remain silent about his fate.
Shekari’s judge had the choice to impose a lighter sentence and chose not to do so. Shekari appealed the verdict but was denied by Iran’s Supreme Court, despite the fact that he was not represented by his lawyer at the time of the appeal.
Zehra Dogan, winner of the 2019 Index on Censorship Freedom of Expression Award for Arts, is a Kurdish painter and journalist. She was released from prison on 24 February 2019 after almost 600 days in prison in Turkey, during which she was denied access to materials for her work. She painted with dyes made from crushed fruit and herbs, even blood, and used newspapers and milk cartons as canvases. When she realised her reports from Turkey’s Kurdish region were being ignored by mainstream media, Dogan began painting the destruction in the town of Nusaybin and sharing it on social media. For this she was arrested and imprisoned. During her imprisonment, she refused to be silenced and continued to produce journalism and art. She collected and wrote stories about female political prisoners, reported on human rights abuses in prison, and painted despite the prison administration’s refusal to supply her with art materials.
Dogan also received the 2019 May Chidiac Foundation Award for Exceptional Courage in Journalism. She accepted the prize in Lebanon where she dedicated the prize to the people of Rojava. Dogan also featured at an exhibition at The Drawing Center in New York entitled The Pencil Is a Key by Incarcerated Artists which will feature drawings by incarcerated people from all over the globe. The exhibition will run until 5 January 2020.
Dogan’s first book, Nous aurons aussi de beaux jours – Écrits de prison (We will also have beautiful days – Writings of prison), a collection of her letters from prison during the 600 days she spent in detention, was released on 31 October 2019. From 6 to 23 of November, works by Dogan will go on display at Galerie des Femmes in Paris as part of her exhibition Œuvres Évadées (Escaped Works).
We caught up with Dogan to find out what she has been working on since winning the Index on Censorship award in April 2019.[/vc_column_text][/vc_column][/vc_row][vc_row][vc_column][vc_basic_grid post_type=”post” max_items=”4″ element_width=”6″ grid_id=”vc_gid:1574072523308-d110cf72-f9a9-3″ taxonomies=”22555″][/vc_column][/vc_row]
İdris Sayılgan’s father Ramazan, mother Sebiha and sisters Tuğba and İrem are waiting for İdris (Credit: Özgün Özçer)
Global press freedom groups, including Index on Censorship, argue Turkey no longer offers domestic remedy
A coalition of 10 international press freedom and journalism organisations has intervened at the European Court of Human Rights (ECtHR) in support of a case brought by İdris Sayılğan, a Turkish-Kurdish journalist jailed since 2016 on baseless anti-terror charges. The intervention focuses on the crucial question of domestic remedy, which has significant implications for the ECtHR’s handling of cases from Turkey.
Jessica Ní Mhainín, policy research and advocacy officer at Index on Censorship said: “Journalists and others in Turkey who have been criminalised and imprisoned for exercising their right to freedom of expression continue to be denied meaningful redress. We are hopeful that the ECtHR will recognise this lack of access to justice by accepting to take up İdris Sayılğan’s case. The situation in Turkey remains deeply concerning and journalists, such as Sayılğan, who speak out on issues relating to Turkey’s Kurdish minority remain particularly at risk.”
Sayılğan worked for the now-shuttered pro-Kurdish Dicle news agency (DİHA) before his arrest on October 7, 2016. Authorities did not inform him of the charge – membership of an armed terrorist organisation – until an indictment was produced nine months later. Typical of Turkey’s ongoing crackdown on the media, prosecutors’ evidence consists solely of Sayılğan’s journalistic work, indicating a politically driven effort to silence criticism.
His detention and trial have been marked by major violations of the right to a fair trial, described in documents filed by Sayılğan’s lawyers before the court. These violations include interference with Sayılğan’s right to legal counsel, denying him the right to appear personally in court, and preventing defence lawyers from calling witnesses. Sayılğan’s appeal to Turkey’s Constitutional Court, filed in July 2018, has gone unanswered. In January 2019, Sayılğan was sentenced to eight years and three months in prison.
The coalition’s intervention argues that the ECtHR should not require applicants from Turkey, such as Sayılğan, to first exhaust all “domestic remedies” – proceeding through all stages of the national-level appeals process – before applying to the Court. This argument is based on evidence that Turkey’s justice system, including the Constitutional Court, no longer offers an effective remedy. Judicial independence has been compromised and courts are unable to address cases in a fair, timely and consistent manner. The ECtHR’s current insistence on domestic remedy in Turkey largely prevents journalists and others from obtaining any meaningful redress to fundamental rights violations suffered.
“Idris Sayılğan’s case is but one of hundreds of examples of arbitrary detention and prosecution of Turkey’s journalists and the abject failure of a judicial system cowed by the political forces unleashed in 2016 to silence criticism,” said IPI Turkey Programmes Manager Oliver Money-Kyrle. “The European Court of Human Rights can offer a first step towards justice by recognising the absence of domestic remedy and accepting to take up Sayılğan’s case.”
A total of 130 journalists are behind bars in Turkey, and most are the victims of a wide-ranging crackdown on critics of the government of President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, which was set in motion following the July 2016 coup attempt and the subsequent enaction of a State of Emergency. Anti-terror laws have been Turkey’s main tool of choice to prosecute the press, though journalists have been frequently held for extended periods without official charges. Indictments invariably rely on journalists’ professional work, including articles, social media posts and conversations with sources. Trials are marked by violations of basic rights of defence.
Sayılğan is represented before the ECtHR by the Media Legal Defence Initiative (MLDI) and the Turkey-based Media and Law Studies Association (MLSA). The application argues violations of Article 5 (liberty and security), 6 (fair trial), 10 (freedom of expression), 13 (effective remedy) and 18 (limitation on rights).
The Intervention was submitted by the International Press Institute (IPI) on Friday, October 18, on behalf of a coalition of leading press and freedom of expression organisations including Article 19, the Association of European Journalists (AEJ), the Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ), the European Centre for Press and Media Freedom (ECPMF), English PEN, the European Federation of Journalists (EFJ), Index on Censorship, the International Federation of Journalists (IFJ) and PEN International. The intervention was drafted with the help of international law firm Freshfields Bruckhaus Deringer.
In this special edition of the Index on Censorship podcast, we celebrate the winners of the Freedom of Expression Awards 2019. Mimi Mefo, a leading voice in exposing the mistreatment of Cameroonian journalists, talks about press freedom in her country; Ritu Gairola, from Cartoonists Rights Network International, discusses why it is effective for cartoonists to use humour to convey political messages; Carolina Botero, from Fundación Karisma, reveals the online threats we should all know about; and Zehra Dogan*, a Kurdish painter and journalist, opens up about finding the courage to continue her work during her imprisonment.
Afterwards, we catch up with Terry Anderson, deputy executive director of CRNI, to learn more about threats to cartoonists worldwide.
