Their crime? They are “enemies of God.”
“Iran confirms two Kurdish journalists sentenced to death,” from AFP:
TEHRAN (AFP) – Iran’s judiciary on Tuesday for the first time confirmed that two Iranian Kurdish journalists have been sentenced to death for being “enemies of God.”
Rights groups had reported that Adnan Hassanpour and Abdolvahed “Hiva” Botimar were sentenced to death on July 16 by a revolutionary court in Marivan, in Iran’s northeastern Kordestan province.
“Botimar and Hassanpour have been sentenced to hanging on the charge of being mohareb,” judiciary spokesman Ali Reza Jamshidi told reporters, using a Koranic legal term that is usually translated as “enemy of God.”
According to Reporters Without Borders (RSF), the two journalists wrote for the magazine Aso (Horizons), before it was banned in August 2005.
Hassanpour published several articles on local politics and gave interviews to foreign media including Voice of America while Botimar was also a member of the environmental NGO Sabzchia, RSF said.
It said that at Hassanpour’s closed door trial, he was found guilty of “activities subverting national security” and “spying,” while his interviews for Voice of America were also cited by the prosecution.
Iran is indeed the guiding light for human rights in the Islamic world.
Crossposted from The American Israeli Patriot.