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Protest against the death penalty in Iran on December 17 in London, England
Photo: IMAGO/Vuk Valcic / IMAGO/ZUMA Wire
Two men who took part in protest movements against the country's leadership were executed in Iran on Saturday.
They allegedly killed a member of the security forces.
According to the judiciary, it is Mohammad Mehdi Karami and Seyyed Mohammad Hosseini.
Mohammad Mehdi Karami was a karate champion.
Pictures on Twitter show certificates and national and international medals.
The activist group 1005tasvir reported that when Karami was arrested, security forces were said to have so brutally beaten him that they initially thought the unconscious man was dead and left him lying there.
Karami is said to have been tortured in the prison itself, and he was also said to have been threatened with rape.
Seyyed Mohammad Hosseini is said to have been 39 years old and taught socially disadvantaged children as a martial arts teacher.
As an employee on a poultry farm, he allegedly earned little himself.
His lawyer said Hosseini was severely ill-treated in custody, according to the London-based IranWire news site.
The two were just featured in a SPIEGEL article alongside other people who are at risk of execution or whose death sentences have already been announced.
Their stories stand for the many other, unknown victims of the regime.
Read the text here.
They are "the main perpetrators of the crime that led to the unjust martyrdom of Ruhollah Adshamian," reported the state news agency IRNA, citing the judiciary.
They were hanged that morning.
Three other people were sentenced to death for the death of Adzhamian, a member of the Basij militia.
Eleven defendants received prison sentences.
The courts do not allow the accused to choose their own lawyers or even see the evidence against them.
Amnesty International has said the trials bear "no resemblance to any meaningful trial".
Hundreds more could face the death penalty
State television broadcast footage of Karami and Hosseini discussing the attack.
Activists later described these as forced confessions.
The men were convicted of murder and "depravity on earth," a Koranic term and a charge that has been made against others in the decades since the 1979 Islamic Revolution, and carries the death penalty.
Two demonstrators were already executed in December in connection with the protests that broke out in September.
According to a report by the human rights organization Iran Human Rights (IHR), the number of unreported cases is likely to be even higher, and at least a hundred other demonstrators are threatened with the death penalty.
The Basij militia is a paramilitary volunteer unit attached to the powerful Revolutionary Guards.
It plays an important role in the massive crackdown on demonstrators.
The protests were sparked by the death of 22-year-old Mahsa Amini.
The Kurd died in police custody on September 16 under disputed circumstances.
The so-called vice police arrested her because she was said to have been dressed inappropriately.
The protests have since grown into the greatest challenge to leadership since 1979.
At that time, the Shah was overthrown in the course of the Islamic Revolution and the Islamic Republic was proclaimed.
mgo/AP/Reuters
