Published December 25, 2023
Iran is “shortly” set to execute a dual Swedish-Iranian citizen accused of spying, according to the UN, after a Swedish court upheld the conviction of a former Iranian official.
Ahmadreza Djalali, a Swedish-Iranian disaster medicine researcher, was arrested in Iran on suspicion of espionage in 2016. He was accused in 2017 of having transmitted information to the Mossad – the Israeli intelligence services – on two people in charge of the Iranian nuclear program, which would have allowed their assassination between 2010 and 2012.
“Disturbing news that Dr. Ahmadreza Djalali could be shortly executed on charges of ‘enmity against God’,” the UN human rights office wrote on X (formerly Twitter).
There have been concerns that the decision by a Swedish appeals court to confirm the conviction of former Iranian prison official Hamid Noury this week could threaten the safety of Swedish prisoners in Iran.
Noury stood accused of involvement in the mass execution of thousands of mainly left-wing prisoners in Iran in 1988, towards the end of the war with Iraq.
The 62-year-old was convicted last year of “grave breaches of international humanitarian law and murder” over his alleged role in a purge that saw at least 5,000 prisoners killed.
Amnesty International has warned that “mounting evidence indicates that Iranian authorities are threatening to carry out Ahmadreza Djalali’s execution in retaliation for their unmet demands to pervert the course of justice in Sweden”.
“The cruel toying with Ahmadreza Djalali’s life immediately after a Swedish court of appeals upheld [Noury’s] conviction and life sentence… heightens concerns that Iranian officials are holding Ahmadreza Djalali hostage to compel Sweden into a prisoner swap,” said Diana Eltahawy, Amnesty’s deputy director for the Middle East and North Africa, in a statement.
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SOURCE: www.zerohedge.com
RELATED: UN Says Swedish Citizen Faces Iran Execution ‘Shortly’
FILE – A demonstration supporting the Swedish-Iranian doctor and researcher Ahmadreza Djalali, who is imprisoned and sentenced to death in Iran, was held in Stockholm, May 14, 2022.
Published December 24, 2023
The United Nations warned Saturday that an Iranian-Swedish citizen is facing imminent execution in Iran after a Swedish court upheld the conviction of a former Iranian prison official.
“Disturbing news that Dr. Ahmadreza Djalali could be shortly executed on charges of ‘enmity against God,'” the U.N. human rights office said on X.
Djalali was sentenced to death in 2017 on espionage charges that have been denounced as baseless by Stockholm and his supporters.
Before his arrest in Iran in April 2016, Djalali was a visiting professor in disaster medicine at Vrije Universiteit Brussel, a Belgian research university.
The U.N. rights office said his execution could take place soon “despite failures to respect fair trial and due process standards.”
“Iran must stop this execution,” it said.
Sweden’s foreign ministry said that “the circumstances in which Ahmadreza Djalali had been detained make for a serious threat to his health.”
The comments came amid fears that a Swedish appeals court decision confirming the conviction of former Iranian prison official Hamid Noury could jeopardize the fate of several Swedish prisoners in Iran.
Amnesty International warned Friday that Djalali in particular was “at grave risk of imminent retaliatory execution” after the court this week confirmed Noury’s life sentence for crimes committed during a 1988 purge of dissidents.
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SOURCE: www.voanews.com
RELATED: Iran: Arbitrarily detained Swedish Iranian academic Ahmadreza Djalali at grave risk of retaliatory execution
Published December 22, 2023
Reacting to alarming developments indicating that Swedish-Iranian academic Ahmadreza Djalali, who has been arbitrarily detained in Iran since April 2016, is at grave risk of imminent retaliatory execution in the country, Amnesty International’s Deputy Director for the Middle East and North Africa Diana Eltahawy said:
“Amid a sharp spike in executions in Iran since November, mounting evidence indicates that Iranian authorities are threatening to carry out Ahmadreza Djalali’s execution in retaliation for their unmet demands to pervert the course of justice in Sweden. The cruel toying with Ahmadreza Djalali’s life immediately after a Swedish court of appeals upheld the conviction and life sentence against former Iranian prison official Hamid Nouri over his role in the 1988 prison massacres heightens concerns that Iranian officials are holding Ahmadrea Djalali hostage to compel Sweden into a prisoner swap.”
Amid a sharp spike in executions in Iran since November, mounting evidence indicates that Iranian authorities are threatening to carry out Ahmadreza Djalali’s execution in retaliation for their unmet demands to pervert the course of justice in Sweden.
Diana Eltahawy, Amnesty International’s Deputy Director for the Middle East and North Africa
“The international community, including Sweden, must immediately call on the Iranian authorities to halt any plans to execute Ahmadreza Djalali, end their shocking assault on the right to life, release him immediately, and put a moratorium on all executions. Iranian officials must be investigated for the crime of hostage-taking”.
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SOURCE: www.amnesty.org
