The regime commutes the death sentence of the player arrested in the framework of the protests over the death of Mahsa Amini to a sentence of 26 years in prison
Amir Reza Nasr Azadani avoided hanging on Monday in the middle of a day marked by the decision to apply the death penalty to five new young people arrested during the protests that Iran has been experiencing for four months. The 26-year-old footballer, whose case has received worldwide attention, will be sentenced to as many years in prison after being found guilty on three counts, including “assisting enmity against God”.
Azadani, a former player for local teams such as Rah-Ahan, Tractor Sazi and Gol-e Rayhan, was arrested in November for his alleged relationship with the death of three security agents in Isfahan, in the center of the country, during the course of of one of the protest demonstrations for the death of Mahsa Amini at the hands of the Morale Police. The footballer will now be able to appeal to the Supreme Court to try to reduce the sentence.
Three of the last five sentenced to death are linked to the same case as Azadani. The other two are Mohammad Ghobadlou, 22, and Mohammad Boroughani, 19, who are awaiting execution in Karaj’s Rajai Shahr prison on the outskirts of Tehran. At the gates of this prison there was a rally in which dozens of relatives, friends and anti-government activists demanded the suspension of the death sentence, something unusual in the Islamic republic due to the strong security measures in these places. Ghobadlou is accused of running over several members of the security forces with his car and killing one of them. In Boroughani’s case, he was found guilty of stabbing an officer to death.
UN complaints
The Justice of Iran has so far carried out four executions after this outbreak of protests, the last two this weekend. The United Nations denounced that the hangings of Mohammad Mahdi Karami and Seyed Mohammad Hosseini occurred after “unfair trials based on forced confessions.” This is the same complaint made by other international organizations such as Amnesty International (AI), which calls for processes with guarantees for the accused.
So far, at least 519 protesters and 68 security personnel have been killed in the unrest, according to the Human Rights Activists News Agency (HRANA).
Azadani’s case has made headlines in the international press and has won the solidarity of the world of football. Faced with the media uproar caused by his situation, the main judge of Isfahan, Asadollah Jafary, declared from the outset that the court will act “without paying attention to the media campaigns.” National ball legends such as Ali Karimi or Ali Daei are voices critical of the regime and the authorities try to mitigate the impact of their messages of support for the protesters.
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