They Were Executed in Secret, Then Buried

Part 1 of this report which was posted yesterday, Rooz reported on interviews with four of the six Sunni Kurdish political prisoners who were executed last week and then buried the next morning in Behesht Sakine cemetery. Hammed Ahmadi, Kamal Molai, Jahangir Dehghani, Jamshid Dehghani, Hadi Hosseini and Sedigh Mohammad are the six Kurdish political prisoners who were executed last week.

As reported in yesterday’s report, family members of the victims told Rooz that they wanted to receive the bodies of their killed family members and bury them in their hometown in Kurdistan but government agents even refused to hand over the bodies of the dead. Family members of Hadi Hosseini told Rooz that even though Hadi had severe psychological illness and had received a red card from Farabi hospital, he was still executed along with the other five Kurds. Family members of Sedigh Mohammadi also told Rooz that Sedigh was a university student and that none of the accusations that the state made against him were true.

Speaking with Rooz, Hamed Ahmadi’s father talked about his efforts to get his son’s body after the execution. “They lied and wanted to bury him without our knowledge. They told us to go back to own residential towns where the bodies of our loved ones would be sent. Instead, they took the bodies to Behesht Sakine cemetery. When we arrived, they had already buried them. They executed our children and denied even their corpses to us,” he said. About the charge that his son was a mohareb (literally meaning fighting God on his representative on earth) he said, “First they (the officials) said that these kids had assassinated cleric Mamoosta and so charged them with murder and being a mohareb . But facts show that these young men were in prison when Mamoosta was killed. Then the officials changed their story and said the kids were mohareb because they had been in contact with opposition groups. This too was not true because our children had not done anything. They were innocent and yet were executed. What is the use in talking about it?”

Family members of the four executed Kurds told Rooz that in their last meeting, their imprisoned children were held in a metal cage while their hands and feet were tied in chains.

Today’s report covers Rooz’s interviews with family members of Hadi Hosseini and Sedigh Mohammadi, the other two Kurdish political prisoners who were executed along with the other four. No information about them has been officially published except that they had cooperated with Salafi groups for which they were sentenced to death.

Hadi Hosseini’s cousin, who was at Rajai Shahr prison in Karaj a few hours prior to the executions spoke with Rooz then. “Hadi Hosseini had mental problems. We do not know what exactly why they arrested him, only that they claim that his was a security, political case. How can a person with a mental illness be a political person,” he asks.

According to his cousin, Hadi was a trader and sold bananas in the bazar. “Everybody knew him. He is accused of being a political-security threat but this poor kid was completely ignorant of everything. I do not understand how they could issue the death penalty sentence for him,” he said.

He was never given permission to see his cousin, not even for the last time. But Hadi’s brother who did visit him has told Rooz, “Can someone who takes 100 pills every month and visits five or six doctors and has records in the hospitals of Kermanshah and Tehran deserve the death penalty? My brother received a red card at Farabi hospital and had absolutely no political activities to deserve being arrested and hurt. You can ask everyone who lives in our town and region about this.” According to his brother, “Hadi did not accept any of the accusations against him which included disrupting security, cooperating with Wahabi and Salafi groups, disrupting social peace etc. My brother was charged with these simply out of innocence and childishness.”

Talking about his last meeting with his brother, Hadi’s brother said, “We had a hard time visiting him because he was in a cage. Believe me he was in a real cage. In that meeting he asked us to resort to God because I have committed no crime and hopefully they will not do anything to me. He said goodbye, and then took us away by force. He was only 32 years old and had been arrested in 2009. He had no political activity.”

The brother of Sedigh Mohammadi, another Kurdish political prisoner who was also among those six executed told Rooz that his executed brother “was a good student at the University of Pakdasht in Karaj. Unfortunately, he was arrested in 2009 because of his views. He was charged but he did not accept any of the accusations. I am certain that none of the charges that were filed against him were true.”

“My brother had no connections with Salafi groups. In our town, there is a group of people who have a certain way of thinking and claim to follow a pure form of Islam. My brother had no relations to them. He was not a member of any group, yet he was arrested while being a student. When they arrested him, he was planning on coming to Tehran to settle his debts with the university and go to serve his military service. Then for two months we did not hear about him until they called us from Sanandaj prison to inform us that he was there. When we arrived there, they told us about the charges against him. I laughed and told them my brother was not capable of that,” he said.

The death penalty of Hadi Hosseini and Sedigh Mohammadi was issued by judge Moghise, the head of division 28 of the revolutionary court. Sedigh Mohammadi’s brother told Rooz, “He was accused of being in contact with foreigners and mohareb , and also that he had committed murder. My brother had said that he knew of the murder but I had nothing to do with it.”

About his last meeting with his brother, he said, “It lasted only ten minutes. His hands and feet were in chains tied to the cage in which he was. He said nothing except that life and death are the prerogative of God and nobody else can take someone’s life. He was consoling us, so we could not really say anything.”

An hour before his brother was executed, Mr. Mohammadi told Rooz, “The only thing I want to say is that I ask officials to look at this case from a special angle. Look at the family conditions and the upbringing of these kids and the conditions that are prevalent in this region. What do these kids of 18 and 20 with their economic conditions know? These kids have suffered since their arrest in 2009 who have been in prison. This situation harms the Islamic republic.”

But despite these, Sedigh Mohammadi was executed. His body and those of other five Kurdish political prisoners are buried many kilometers away from their hometown and that of their family members.