Amnesty International has launched an urgent appeal to save the lives of two Iranian Arab men which it fears are at risk of imminent execution by the Iranian regime.
Ali Chebieshat and Sayed Khaled Mousawi were arrested on November 10, 2012, and taken to a Ministry of Intelligence detention centre in Ahvaz where they were denied access to lawyers and their families for several months.
They are believed to have been tortured and were shown on Iranian state television in June 2013 ‘confessing’ to their role in the explosion of the gas pipeline.
The Ministry of Intelligence officials told the men’s families in June or July 2013 that they could meet their loved ones in a mosque in the village of Jarieh, but when they arrived there, the families realized that the room was equipped with cameras.
They were told that if they agreed to be filmed while watching their relatives’ recorded ‘confessions’, the authorities would consider less harsh punishments, Amnesty said.
But they were not told that the recorded footage would be aired on national TV.
Mr Chebieshat and Mr Mousawi were then sentenced to death on September 9, 2013, by Branch Two of the Revolutionary Court in Ahvaz on the charge of ‘enmity against God’ (moharebeh), and an appeal against the sentence is still under consideration by the Supreme Court.
Meanwhile, they have been transferred from Fajr Prison in Dezfoul, Khuzestan province, to an unknown location, sparking fears their execution may be imminent.
A third man arrested with them named as Salman Chayani was also sentenced to 25 years imprisonment to be served in internal exile in Yazd, central Iran.
The human rights group also noted that two other Iranian Arab men, Hadi Rashedi and Hashem Sha’bani Nejad (also referred to as Hashem Sha’bani Amouri), were executed in secret at the end of January 2014, without their families being told the death sentence was to be carried out.
