Kurdish brothers to be executed by Iranian government

Kurdish brothers to be executed by Iranian government

According to information ANF Kurdish service obtained from local sources in the East Kurdistan city of Sine, two jailed Kurdish politicians, brothers Lokman and Zanyar Muradi, will be executed by the Iranian regime in the coming days. The Muradi brothers are currently held in Gewher Detþ prison in the city of Kerece and were subjected to torture before being sentenced to death penalty on charges of "waging a war against God" in 2010. The death penalty for two brothers was approved by Iranian high court last month.

The Muradi family, informed about the death penalty last month, called on the international opinion to take action to stop the execution of their two sons.

Following the approval of the penalty last month, the Muradi brothers wrote a letter in which they said that “The prison administration has informed us that we will be hanged in front of the people. We have been subjected to torture under which we were forced to sign some documents and to admit to crimes we never committed. We ask Kurds and world public opinion to take action to stop our execution”.

Among the recently executed Kurdish prisoners in Iran are Eziz Xakzad, who was was secretly hanged in Kerman central prison on 4 October 2011, Iran's Kurdistan Democratic Party (IKDP) member Ferhad Tarim,who was hanged in Urmiye prison on 27 January 2011, and Hüseyin Xizri who whose secret execution in in Urmiye prison on January 5 exposed on January 15.

Among other hanged political prisoners are PJAK militant Hasan Himet Demir who was hanged in 2007, Ýhsan Fetahiyan on 11 November 2009, Fesih Yasemini on 6 January 2010 and Kurdish teachers Ferzad Kemanger, Ferhad Wekili, Eli Heyderiyan and Þirin Elem Hulu who were executed on 9 May 2010.

Together with China, Saudi Arabia and the U.S., Iran takes place among the very few countries with the highest rate of death penalty. Iranian sharia laws order execution for the crimes of murder, rape, armed robbery, adultery and drug trafficking which is known to be the most common crime committed in the country.

According to a UN expert report, the Iranian regime sentenced 300 people to death penalty in the first eight months of 2012 and 670 people in 2011. The real number of death sentences is however thought to be higher as the Human Rights Watch (HRW) and Harm Reduction International (HRI) stated that the Iranian regime sentenced over 1000 people to death on the grounds of drug trafficking in 2010 and 2011. This number is said to have been tripled in comparison to earlier years.