Stop Child Executions

New work by : arshannn - sarbazan vatan

بچه های ایرانی




View Current Signatures - Sign the Petition
Please note Mohammad Mousavi (#13 on petition) was executed on April 22, 2007. Also Saeed Kamberzaii (17) was executed on May 28, 2007. Since the start of petition , Stop Child Executions Campaign has recorded more children facing executions in Iran.

For an updated list (currently 74 ) please visit: http://www.stopchildexecutions.com/the_row.aspx or http://scenews.blog.com/1931411/

To: Secretary General of the United Nations Ban Ki-moon, Supreme Leader of the Islamic Republic of Iran Ayatollah Seyed Ali Khamenei and Head of the Judiciary of the Islamic Republic of Iran Ayatollah Mahmoud Hashemi Shahroudi

PERSIAN TRANSLATION: www.stopchildexecutions.com MORE INFORMATION: http://www.stopchildexecutions.com/

We, the undersigned, are deeply concerned about the continuous practice of capital punishment for alleged offences committed by Iranian youth under the age of 18. Article 6.5 of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR) declares: “Sentence of death shall not be imposed for crimes committed by persons below eighteen years of age”. Article 37(a) of the Convention on the Rights of the Child (CRC) provides that: “Neither capital punishment nor life imprisonment without possibility of release shall be imposed for offences committed by persons below eighteen years of age”. As a signatory state, the Iranian government is under international obligation to comply with both articles. However, Amnesty International has documented 21 executions of child offenders in Iran since 1990. In many cases, these minors have been imprisoned until the age of 18 and then executed. In January 2005, the UN Committee on the Rights of the Child, which monitors states' compliance with the CRC, urged Iran to immediately stay all executions of child offenders and to abolish the use of the death penalty in such cases. In the summer of 2006, the Iranian Parliament reportedly passed a bill establishing special courts for children and adolescents. However, it has not yet been approved by the Council of Guardians, which supervises Iran's legislation to ensure conformity with Islamic principles. During the past four years, the Iranian authorities have reportedly been considering legislation to ban the death penalty for child offenders. Recent comments by a judiciary spokesperson indicates that the proposed law would only prohibit the death penalty for certain crimes, and not all crimes committed by children. In spite of these efforts, the number of child offenders executed in Iran has risen during the past two years. As of March 2007 at least 25 child offenders remain on death row in Iran.

Their names and ages (where known) at the times of their alleged crimes are as follows: 1. Delara Darabi, 17 2. Beniamin Rasouli, 17 3. Hossein Toranj, 17 4. Hossein Haghi, 17 5. Morteza Feizi, 16 6. Sa'eed Jazee, 17 7. Ali Mahin Torabi, 16 8. Milad Bakhtiari, 16 9. Farshad Sa'eedi, 17 10. Hossein Gharabaghloo, 16 11. Shahram Pourmansouri, 17 12. Hedayat Niroumand, 15 13. Mohammad Mousavi, 14. Mostafa, 16 15. Mahmoud, 17 16. Hamid, 17 17. Sajjad, 17 18. Farzad, 15 19. Asghar, 16 20. Iman, 17 21. Ne'mat, 15 22. Hamzeh S, 17 23. Saber 24. Reza Alinejad 17 25. Sina Paymand 17 We the undersigned, call on the Iranian authorities to: - Provide a complete list of all individuals under the age of 18 who are sentenced to death. - Immediately halt executions and prevent any further application of such penalties against child offenders. - Take immediate measures to permanently abolish the death penalty for all child offenders in accordance with Iran's obligations as a state party to the ICCPR and the CRC. We the undersigned, urge The United Nations, The United Nations High Commissioner of Human Rights and The UN Committee on the Rights of the Child to: - Demand that the Iranian government immediately comply with its international obligations as defined by ICCPR and CRC.
Sincerely,
The Undersigned - View Current Signatures

Support Iran's Jailed and Tortured Students!
February 06, 2008 marxist.com Militaant

Behind a cynical and bogus campaign for ‘national unity’ in the face of pressure from the United Sates, the Iranian regime has raised the level of repression against many sections of society. Whether it is the bus drivers, teachers, sugar mill workers, labour activists, women, journalists, or anyone who voices the slightest criticism against the policies of the most rotten and reactionary dictatorship of the twenty-first century, they are subjected to the most brutal and vicious forms of physical and psychological torture in its jails.During the past few months the most consistent resistance to this regime has come from various student groups. The regime’s attacks against this movement have resulted in at least one death in custody, at least three confirmed cases of severe physical torture, and general abuse and lack of contact with families.The main event that triggered such a response from the regime was a gathering at Tehran University on 4 December in commemoration of Students’ Day. Around 500 students and left-wing activists took part in the event. Initially 26 people, mainly from Tehran University’s Radical Left group, were arrested but since then over a dozen other students from various universities have been arrested. Although a few have now been released on bail the majority remain in prison and their incarceration is dampening the morale of all movements in society.To show solidarity with the imprisoned students a number of Iranian opposition groups are organising pickets outside the Iranian regime’s diplomatic missions on Saturday 16 February 2008, from 12-2pm. We urge all student activists, trade unionists, socialists and defenders of human rights to support this united move of the opposition in highlighting the plight of the students still in jail.A victory for the students can open the way for more victories by workers, women and other oppressed and exploited sections of society. Join us on 16 February in support of the students. For more information on the picket in your city, or on how you can become involved, contact militantmag@gmail.com or check our English language blog.On 16 February our main slogan will be: Free all jailed students now!
Iranian regime tortures arrested students! by Militaant (January 31, 2008)
Iran: Mahmoud Salehi rushed to hospital by Iranian Workers' Solidarity Network (December 18, 2007)
Students threatened with arrest if they go near Tehran University! by "Against the status quo" blog (December 5, 2007)
Five hundred students and left-wing activists commemorate Students’ Day at Tehran University by "Against the status quo" blog (December 4, 2007)

Islamic Republic Of Idiots Executes another child

The story of an execution : By Azarin Sadegh

Last month I wrote about Sina, an 18-year-old boy in Iran who was going to be executed. Sina’s story had a happy ending. His last wish was to play his beloved instrument, Nay, for the last time. When he did, the magical sound of his music softened the heart of the victim’s family, and they forgave him. When I heard Sina’s story for the first time, I wondered about another innocent condemned to death who lacks Sina’s talents in music. Was he going to die? What does it mean if an accused person cannot rely on the justice system, if instead, as lonely as it sounds, his only hope is the extent of his own limited abilities? What if the accused is sixteen years old and doesn’t play Nay?

Ali Mahin Torabi

This is the true story of this man:
Today my friend in Iran called me. She told me about the imminent execution of Ali Mahin Torabi, her nephew. He’s 21 years old, and he has been declared guilty of a murder he hasn’t committed. He has spent the last five years of his life—since he was 16 years old--in a prison, waiting for his execution. After his arrest, if Ali hadn’t protected his friends by taking the blame, or if he had a rich family, or if his father had better connections, and if there was a true justice system in Iran based on the Justice and the Truth, maybe he wouldn’t have been where he is now. Still during these five years in prison, Ali studied hard to get his high school diploma and now he has also the responsibility of their library’s computer systems. He is still full of life and hope but my friend sounded so desperate. She asked me to help Ali. I write this with that task weighing heavily upon my shoulders. Where to begin? I searched the Internet and was stunned to learn there are at least another 80 children in the same situation as Ali—young people waiting to be executed for crimes they allegedly committed when they were minors. One on this sinister list is a 13-year-old girl. I stare in horror at the images on the internet of countless public hangings. In the crowds watching this vision of horror, stand children, and all I can think about is what lessons they are learning. They stare at the soulless eyes of an alleged criminal, the one who will, in just one second, become a victim. Then I find another image: a hanged woman in black chador dancing in the air; the figure is imposing and sinister, and isolated. It’s as if this picture belongs to another place, another race, another dimension. It’s as if time has stopped, and all humanity is linked through one hanged woman’s despair. My mind drifts.
No, I think. I don’t need to look at this image. I don’t need to write this nightmare. Why should I write such a story? This is a vision I don’t want to see. These are words I don’t want to read. There is this crushing silence I don’t want to break. I think: There is this truth I don’t dare defy. The weight on my shoulders grows heavier....still more. Should I contact humanitarian organizations? Should I send letters and emails? Should I make phone calls? What can I actually achieve? I am not in Iran . I am not a lawyer. I have no important connections. I am nobody. What can I do other than write about Ali who sits awaiting execution for a crime he did not commit, who has sat there, among so many others, for so many years? How am I supposed to tell his story? This story should stab, Kafka wrote. That means Ali’s story should shock and awaken. That means I should dream about it, over and over and over again. That means I should change and change again my wording to hone the piece until it is pure perfection. That means I should fall asleep every night repeating this same story, to find the exact place of each word in the flow of my narration. Each word has to be where it should be. My story must reveal the randomness of this cruelty, and I must mention hope, and yes, even love. I know I have to please all those who read it and move those who have never cared—not for innocents hanged, not for young men and women in Iran , not for others. I know I must convey impossible empathy, and I must do this only with my words and even through the blank gaps between words. I must push you, my reader, to read on and at the same time make the reading of Ali’s fate harder and harder to bear. So you will suffer alongside Ali who sits alone in his cell, imagining a rope, imagining a hand, imagining the void beneath his feet - for the one millionth time. It is how, all of us, we will never leave this moment, this moment of a man’s tangible sorrow. It is how we will share his futureless existence; we will believe his beliefs and we will sink in the pool of his despair. We are going to belong to that place, to that hanging place, where we will turn into Ali. But maybe for once, only this time, we will not shut our mouths out of fright. For once, we will be united - no matter where we come from, and we will shout and scream: “Stop it. Stop the execution of Ali. Stop the execution of children in Iran .” But? How? How do I begin to tell this story? How is it going to end? How will my writing save Ali?