Iran accelerates executions: Four Baloch hanged on eve of Human Rights Day

Dozzap (Zahedan): On Friday, December 9, when the rest of the world was preparing to celebrate and mark International human rights day, Iran was busy executing Baloch citizens in Central prison in the Kerman region.

The inmates were relocated to the quarantine section of the prison one day before their execution.

The identities victims have been ascertained as 23-year-old Khalid Shahbakhsh son of Ismail resident of Dozzap (Zahedan), Gholam Brahui also known as Mazar resident of Lutak Nusratabad (Zabul), Saeed Dehmardeh son of Mohammad Rahim, and Ibrahim Sistani son of Bahlol originally from Baluchistan was residing in the city of Rafsanjan.

It is said that Gholam was arrested in Bam in 2017, Khalid in 2018 and Ebrahim and Saeed were arrested in Kerman in 2019. They were charged with drug offences.

According to reports, Khalid Shahbakhsh had been sentenced to 25 years in prison for drug-related crimes, but his sentence was changed to the death penalty to revenge an armed conflict between two Baloch men from the Shahbakhsh tribe with Iranian Military forces, known as Kerman’s Ranger Unit Forces.

Seven Iranian military personnel including a colonel were killed in that clash.

Sources informed BW News that the Kerman prison officials initially did not allow Khalid’s families to make their final visit, but the prisoner’s family managed to meet with him at the last minute after hours of waiting in front of the prison.

The families of Ibrahim and Saeed were allowed for only ten minutes visit in the last moments before their execution.

The dead bodies of victims were handed over to their families around 11:00 AM on Friday.

In recent days, the number of Baluch executions in the prisons of the Islamic Republic of Iran has increased significantly. Iran has executed more than 60 Baloch since the beginning of 2021.

Independent observers believe that the recent anger and resistance of Baloch people to Iran’s conspiracy to divide Iranian Occupied Balochistan into further administrative units has prompted Iran to accelerate killings and collective punishment in Balochistan.