11 Iranian Women's Rights Activists Sentenced To Over 60 Years
Eleven women's rights activists in Gilan province, north of Iran, who were detained in August, have been collectively sentenced to more than 60 years in prison.
Eleven women's rights activists in Gilan province, north of Iran, who were detained in August, have been collectively sentenced to more than 60 years in prison.
Mostafa Nili, the lawyer representing two of them, disclosed details on Wednesday. The women were each sentenced on charges including "membership in an illegal group," and “propaganda against the system."
Their arrests came just a month before the anniversary of Mahsa Amini's death in morality-police custody after being arrested for defying the mandatory hijab in September 2022.
The authorities often employ tactics such as arbitrary arrests, intimidation, harassment, and even violence to suppress opposition voices and maintain control. Human rights defenders, journalists, students, and members of minority groups are particularly vulnerable to persecution.
The government frequently justifies the crackdowns under the guise of national security or combating threats to the Islamic Republic's ideological integrity. Despite international condemnation and calls for reform, the Iranian regime continues to tighten its grip on civil liberties, creating a climate of fear and censorship that restricts freedom of expression and assembly within the country.
Since 2018, growing numbers of women have been arrested in Iran including activists, students, lawyers and even revolutionary insiders, such as Faezeh Hashemi, the daughter of former President Hashemi Rafsanjani, who criticized the regime or participated in protests.
Journalists have also suffered increasing crackdowns including the arrests of Niloofar Hamedi and Elahe Mohammadi, who were among the first to report the 2022 death of Mahsa Amini.
The regime has also imprisoned female lawyers who represented prominent activists, dissidents or political prisoners, according to the Center for Human Rights in Iran.
Rights group Amnesty International branded the crackdowns part of an "escalating crackdown to quash Iran’s civil society.” Lawyers and others affiliated with the Defenders of Human Rights Center advocacy group have been subjected to “excessive sentences and punishments for engaging in regular professional activities,” the organization said.
Their reflections on the past are primarily centered around the recent highly controversial election, which the country sees as a nightmare that it has partially left behind. However, as the holidays conclude, the nation anticipates the continuation of this nightmare with a run-up election in May.
The heavily manipulated vote for parliament on March 1 saw hardliners barring most other regime insiders from running for office. As a result, the election experienced the lowest turnout in 45 years, with widespread public apathy keeping a large majority of voters away from ballot boxes.
Khabar Online website in Tehran conducted brief interviews with ten Iranian political figures, seeking their perspectives on the best and worst events of the Iranian year that concluded on March 20.
Among the respondents, which included former lawmakers, a former state TV Chief (Mohammad Hashemi), and various politicians from different affiliations, the overwhelming consensus identified the March 1 election as the most adverse event of the past year.
Former judiciary head Sadeq Amoli Larijani, who lost the Assembly of Experts election in Mazandaran Province, and Majles Speaker Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf were highlighted as notable losers. Ghalibaf, who secured over 1.2 million votes in 2021, saw a drastic reduction to just over 400,000 votes in 2024. However, respondents highlighted that almost everyone in the country could be considered a loser.
Reformist politician Gholam Ali Rajai expressed a sentiment shared by many, stating that even a destructive earthquake would have been preferable to the March 1 election. The devastation left behind by an earthquake could be compensated, but the losses caused by this election, which brought radicals to power, will have serious long-term consequences, he said.
Additionally, concerns were raised about the ongoing economic crisis under President Ebrahim Raisi's administration, as well as security issues highlighted by terrorist attacks in Shiraz and Kerman in the past year. Only one respondent, former presidential candidate Mostafa Hashemi Taba, singled out the government's neglect of environmental issues as the most significant failure of the past year.
When asked to grade the government's performance on a scale from zero to 20, opinions varied widely. While three hardline politicians, including Islamic Coalition Party member Hamid Reza Taraqqi, awarded grades between 14 to 18, others were far less generous, with two politicians assigning grades below 10, including two zeros.
Evaluating the performance of the outgoing parliament, except three hardline former lawmakers, the other seven respondents branded the parliament a total failure.
Meanwhile, three hardliners named the launching of a satellite to the space as the country's best event in the past year. Reformist Rajaei said winning the Nobel Peace Prize by jailed activist Narges Mohammadi was the best that happened to Iran last year.
Looking at the future, in another Interview, General Hossein Alai, a former commander of the IRGC naval Force and a reformist politician, said that the Islamic Republic needs to bring about a meaningful change in its economic and political policies and conduct.
Alai reiterated that significant changes are needed in the government's domestic and foreign policies as well as in the areas of economy and the way the government appoints its managers. He added that the government should do away with the arbitrary vetting of election candidates by the Guardian Council so that the people can believe that they can determine their own fate.
At least 767 Iranians were executed in the year ending March 2024, according to the Human Rights Activists News Agency (HRANA). That is more than double the figure for the year ending March 2022, when 333 were executed. Some human rights reports have mentioned a slightly higher numbers.
Many human rights activists say the executions have very little to do with justice and are designed primarily to ‘set examples’ and instill fear in the wider society to make it easier to control. At least eight people were hanged over trumped-up charges related to the nationwide protests of 2022, with several more protesters currently on death row.
A recent Amnesty International report further underscored the severity of the situation, revealing that from January 1, 2012, to July 31, 2023, over five thousand individuals, including at least 57 children, were executed in Iran.
It is widely believed that most executions in Iran are drug-related. There’s little trust in official accounts, however, since there’s no transparency and no real due process. So activists say they fear that the regime may use criminal charges as cover for political cases, especially if the accused is from the ‘periphery’ and lacks support networks to follow and publicize their case.
The United Nations special rapporteur on human rights in Iran has stated that the number of executions of ethnic and religious minorities in Iran is disproportionately high.
According to human rights watchers Hengaw, in 2023, about 4 out 10 of all executions have been Baluch (183) or Kurd (151). Both ethnic groups are highly active politically, and both played parts in the most recent wave of protests (2022) that was far greater than their size in Iran’s population.
Iranian judiciary officials routinely deny any conflation of dissent with criminal activity. When questioned by Western journalists about executions or human rights abuses, Iranian officials consistently maintain the official stance that the judiciary operates independently and is not answerable to the presidential administration.
While the latter claim holds some truth, the former does not. In reality, Iran’s judiciary primarily serves as a tool to suppress dissent, a role it has fulfilled since the inception of the regime in 1979. Even constitutionally, the judiciary lacks true independence, as its head is appointed and dismissed by the Supreme Leader.
It's no surprise, then, that the judicial system tends to align closely with the desires and directives of Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei.
In July 2022, prior to the widespread protests in Iran (now better known as Women Life Freedome uprising), Khamenei made a dark reference to the notorious 1980s, when thousands of political prisoners were executed summarily, often after one or two questions, without even a sham trial.
"Our God today is the same God of the 1980s," he said.
The judiciary got the message. So did human rights organizations and activists, many of whom warned of more executions on the horizon. And they seem to have been right.
In the year and a half that followed, executions soared – from 333 in the year ending March 2022 to 617 in the year ending March 2023 and to 767 in the past year.
This sharp rise brought the total executed in Iran in the last decade to around five thousand people, according to Amnesty International, among them at least 57 children.
In his November 2023 report to the United Nations General Assembly, UN secretary general Antonio Guterres warned of an “alarming” growth in the number of executions in Iran. Many inside and outside Iran echoed this sentiment, urging the Iranian regime to stop the “state killings”, with numerous protests organized worldwide.
Last month, Khamenei dismissed the international outcry, calling it “ some noise”, and labeling those executed as "criminals." He also made the most of the Palestinians’ plight. "Westerners who make a fuss over the execution of a criminal have closed their eyes to the massacre of 30,000 people in Gaza," he said.
That’s probably not far off the total number of executions in Iran under Khamenei’s rule – since 1989.
