Alison Langley
FRANKFURT, Mar 30 (IPS) – An exiled Iranian opposition group claims it has received reports that one of seven political prisoners jailed at the Gohardasht prison has been informed he will be executed in May.
National Council of Resistance Iran (NCRI), a Paris-based umbrella association of dissident groups, and Amnesty International, the London-based human rights organisation, believe the execution may be in retaliation for Iran being sent to the United Nations Security Council for its nuclear programme.
Valiollah Feyz-Mahdavi, 28, is believed to have been arrested in 2001 and sentenced to death after being convicted of moharebeh (enmity with God), a term often applied to those accused of armed resistance to the state), an Amnesty International official said in London. Feyz-Mahdavi was reportedly tried before a Revolutionary Court, but did not have access to a lawyer, the AI official added.
An NCRI official in Paris said his organisation in Teheran had received word from Feyz-Mahdavi that his sentence will be carried out May 6. Kate Willingham, an Amnesty International official said they had received information that Feyz-Mahdavi will be executed May 16.
Feyz-Mahdavi is one of seven members of the armed Peoples Mojahedin of Iran (PMOI), which in turn is the largest member of NCRI. In August, 2002, the NCRI handed the International Atomic Energy Agency secret papers documenting that Iran ran secret nuclear programmes.
Willingham said earlier this month that she believes Feyz-Mahdavi’s imminent death, following a Februrary execution are in retaliation for NCRI’s involvement in handing IAEA the papers.
In February, Hojjat Zamani, a PMOI member accused of planting a bomb outside a Revolutionary Court in Tehran in 1998, was hanged in Ghordasht prison, located just outside of Tehran.
Amnesty says all seven prisoners are in danger of being hanged in retaliation for NCRI’s revelations.
In addition to Feyz-Mahdavi, Amnesty International believes the following men are at risk of being executed: Sa’id Masouri, a PMOI member who has been held in solitary confinement in Evin Prison since late 2004, Khaled Hardani, Farhang Pour Mansouri and Shahram Pour Mansouri, all three of whom were involved in a 2001 plane hijacking, Gholamhossein Kalbi, also a PMOI member, and Alireza Karami Khairabadi.
NCRI handed IAEA papers detailing an 18-year, 10 billion dollar nuclear programme in Natanz, Arak and Abe-Ali. The documents, which proved a hidden uranium enrichment programme, were the first indication the world had that Iran was working on a nuclear programme.
In 2003, the IAEA confirmed the existence of the uranium enrichment programme in Iran. The Iranian government claims its work is to produce nuclear energy. IAEA officials worry, however, that the government is also trying to develop nuclear weapons.
Amnesty officials believe the Iranian government links the PMOI to the nuclear controversy. Because of that link, Willingham has said that PMOI prisoners said they have been told they will be executed if Iran is referred to the United Nations Security Council over its nuclear programme.
Iran was referred to the Security Council earlier this year. The Security Council has yet to agree on the wording of a statement or condemnation of the country.
None of the seven prisoners named by NCRI and Amnesty International is believed to have been involved in the leaking of the secret documents.
News of Feyz-Mahdavi’s death sentence came from Shahin Gobadi, an exiled member of NCRI in Paris. Feyz-Mahdavi received a letter informing him that his sentence will be carried out May 6, Gobadi said. Feyz-Mahdavi informed NCRI members that he had also been threatened with death by Ali Mohammadi, a Gohardasht prison official, Gobadi added.
"Obviously the Iranian regime is upset by its referral to the Security Council," Gobadi said. "They blame the NCRI because we revealed to the world their nuclear programme. But you have to bear in mind that executions go on all the time in Iran."
The NCRI has documented 21,000 executions of political prisoners by the Iranian regime since it came to power in 1981, Gobadi said. But his organisation believes the true number is much higher, he added.
(NCRI would like to confirm the date May 16 for the death sentence to be carried out and it was mentioned in its secretariate’s statement issued yesterday)
