Iran: Regime Starts 2024 With Executions, Persecution Of Political Prisoners – OpEd

Parallel to its warmongering in the region, Iran’s regime continues to ratchet up human rights abuses in its prisons, especially against political prisoners. And the beginning of the new year has shown no respite in this trend of barbaric behavior.

On Tuesday, January 2, regime authorities in Ghezel Hesar prison in Karaj executed political prisoner Davood Abdollahi. Abdollahi, a Sunni Kurd hailing from Mahabad, had been in prison for 14 years and was executed while being on a hunger strike for six days.

Abdollahi was arrested in 2009 along with six other people in 2009. All seven were tortured to make incriminating confessions and were sentenced to death by the notorious judge Mohammad Moghiseh under trumped up charges of “undermining national security,” “propaganda against the regime,” and “corruption on Earth.”

In 2018, Abolghassem Salavati, another criminal judge with a terrible track record of human rights abuses, confirmed their death sentence and in 2019, the regime’s supreme court reaffirmed the sentence.

Ghassem Abesteh, another prisoner from the same group, was executed on November 5 and Ayoub Karimi was hanged on November 29. The four remaining prisoners are under the threat of being executed.

And the regime finished the year off with another wave of executions. Only in five days from December 27 to 31, the regime carried out at least 30 prisoners. The total number of declared executions for 2023 was at least 850, with an alarming uptick in death penalty since the outbreak of the war in Gaza.

At the same time, the regime is raising pressure on other political prisoners. The most recent case is the three-year extension of the prison sentence of political prisoner Maryam Akbari Monfared. She was slated to be released this year after completing her 15-year sentence, which she has endured without any furlough. But the regime’s Ministry of Intelligence fabricated two new dossiers against her to prevent her release. The MOIS began plotting these cases in August 2023 in order to prevent her release. These cases were heard in orchestrated courts in Semnan and Evin. She now faces a total of 18 years in prison.

Under the regime’s own laws, Maryam Akbari Monfared was supposed to be released in 2019 after serving 10 years of her sentence. Her main “crime” was seeking justice for her siblings, who were murdered by the regime.

Three of Akbari Monfared’s brothers and a sister were executed by the mullahs’ regime. Alireza Akbari, a PMOI member, was executed in 1981. Gholamreza Akbari, also a member of the PMOI, was murdered under torture in 1985. PMOI members Abdulreza and Roghiyeh Akbari were executed during the 1988 massacre of more than 30,000 political prisoners. The massacre was overseen by Ebrahim Raisi, the regime’s current president.

Akbari Monfared is one of several political prisoners who are being persecuted by the regime because they are relatives of supporters of the PMOI. In another recent case, the regime has denied 70-year-old political prisoner Ali Moezi access to much-needed medical care.

The regime continues to raise pressure on dissidents and political prisoners as it fears losing hold on power inside the country. Despite the regime’s wave of suppressive measures, protests continue across the country, and the ranks of PMOI Resistance Unitscontinue to expand.