Iran Juvenile Executions: Amnesty International Protests Death Sentence Of Juveniles

A week after the execution of a 22-year-old Iranian woman, Delara Darabi, two more controversial cases have emerged to contribute to the country's highly criticized record of illegal (by international law) juvenile executions: Amir Khaleqi and Safar Angooti. However, according to the Guardian, the two juveniles' executions have reportedly been put on hold at the last minute.

Amnesty International is expressing particular outrage with how quickly the Iranian government sought to execute the two youths in the aftermath of the Delara Darabi execution last week, stating in a press release: "The scheduling of these executions, just days after the appalling execution of Delara Darabi, shows that the Iranian authorities have total disregard for international law which unequivocally bans the execution of those convicted of crimes committed under the age of 18."

Darabi became an iconic figure during her 5-year stint on death row, underscoring the egregious and brutal nature of the Iranian penal system and drawing international attention and support. According to the Independent:

Ms Darabi - dubbed The Prisoner of Colours for the love of painting she developed whilst on death row - was convicted for murdering her father's wealthy cousin in September 2003, when she was just 17. Although she initially confessed to the crime, she later said she had been persuaded to take the blame by her older boyfriend Amir Hossein. It was in fact Mr Hossein who had killed the rich relation, she said, to get the money.

The 19-year-old allegedly told Ms Darabi that she could save him from the gallows by confessing and that would be no risk to her own life because she was still a minor. The young woman complied. Her boyfriend was sentenced to 10 years in prison for complicity to murder; she was sentenced to death.

The particulars of the Amir Khaleqi and Safar Angooti cases are highlighted in Amnesty International's press release:

According to Mohammad Mostafaie, the lawyer of the child offenders facing execution today, Amir Khaleqi killed a man during a fight when he was drunk. He was 16 years old at the time. Amir does not remember how the incident happened but was so remorseful that he turned himself into the police. He was eventually convicted, despite the court taking into consideration that he was intoxicated, and a juvenile offender.

The Head of Judiciary granted a two-month stay of execution for Amir in February which has now expired and his execution is scheduled to take place on Wednesday 6 May.

Safar Angooti was convicted of murder at age 17. According to the newspaper Etemad, in April 2008 he stabbed a rival suitor who was talking to a girl he liked and was sentenced to death. Safar claimed that he had killed the man but not intentionally.

According to reports their lawyer, Mohammad Mostafaie, was himself arrested yesterday when he left a meeting with Judiciary Spokesman, Ali Reza Jamshidi, in which he tried to get the executions halted. He was released after a few hours.

Amnesty also points out that Iran has already executed two juveniles so far this year -- making it is the only country in the world to have done so since 2007 -- and that at least 135 other juveniles are known to currently be sitting on death row.

Get HuffPost World On Facebook and Twitter!

Comments

[andycan]

11:37 AM on 05/07/2009

A GULAG FOR AFRICAN AMERICANS

Why don't you run more stories on the two million strong American Gulag? (with a huge preponderance of African Americans) In Alabama and elsewhere there are still chain gangs harking back to slavery!
Charity begins at home.

[Horst]

12:48 PM on 05/07/2009

This is an article about a UK based organization protesting the actions of the Iranian government...not about America's prison system.

[wereeverywhere]

01:12 PM on 05/07/2009

When one doesn't like the topic, one changes it- neither polite nor effective argument. As someone appalled by US prison conditions, I find the above comment embarrassing. It's not as though US prison methods are such a weak topic that it has to parasitically insert itself in a thread that exposes how authoritarian mullahs 'think' in IRI.

[Paulo1]

10:13 AM on 05/07/2009

Killing kids is bad.

If you are not in agreement with that then you are not civilized.

End of discussion.

[chirps]

01:12 PM on 05/07/2009

Kids killing you isn't good either.

[Horst]

09:35 AM on 05/07/2009

Amnesty International should not question the Koran.....who do they think they are? Why did Allah put stones all over the place? For people to use them of course!

[TheBlackCat]

07:47 AM on 05/07/2009

It's not like this is an original idea, but it's still a good point.

When a 16 year old is he victim of a crime, they're a child

When a 16 year old perpetrates a crime, they're an adult.

You can't have it both ways. Either kids are kids, or they're not. You don't get to call them grown ups ONLY for punitive purposes.

[pianoteacher]

10:30 PM on 05/06/2009

Sad that death sentences exist in any country, but this type of sentence for a juvenile is extremely disturbing.

Kind of off-topic, but if I'm not mistaken, that's a picture of the gallows at Tombstone, AZ. I could Google it to be sure, but it looks just like it.

[pianoteacher]

10:33 PM on 05/06/2009

... or maybe just ironic, as opposed to 'off-topic' ...

[davkaman]

09:55 PM on 05/06/2009

Iran's odious record of executing children is well known. And how the beautiful people at Durban 2 showered praise and applause on the Great Friend of Humanity, Ahmadinejad. Not unlike the Nazi occupiers of Eastern Europe, the Iranian regime has a macabre penchant for taking photos of their cherished executions. Proud man that he is, Ahmadinejad should send all of the fawning delegates autographed photos of these most recent executions of juveniles. Let his Durban partisans look at them, closely, and cherish them.
How sickening.

[Connolly1916]

06:02 PM on 05/06/2009

Well whaddya know, there's something that Texas and Iran have in common...

[hmmmmmer]

07:39 PM on 05/06/2009

No joke, how can we pass judgment when we ourselves of guilt of the same thing. That being said, Iran is a backward hate filled nation because of the insane religious dictates.

[ritgar]

09:10 PM on 05/06/2009

..and that is different from Texas how??

[naschkatze]

09:44 PM on 05/06/2009

Sounds to me that you are only expatiating on Connolly1916's statement.

[goodog]

04:51 PM on 05/06/2009

Aside from those earnestly opposed to the death penalty altogether and those broadly opposed to executing anyone under the age of 18, there are those who are generally opposed in either case but recognize special circumstances and therefore perhaps a sad and conflicted necessity for peculiarly violent and remorseless repeat offenders to receive a death penalty.

Of course, there are the "hang 'em all" crowd who are little better than the immature repeat offenders.

I think Iran is a little free and easy with the noose and that few in the Western world would argue that it has made them a better country, but I wonder if these teen executions are considered special circumstances within Iran, or if most are treated the same, regardless of age.

Is this an appallingly high case of special circumstances or an appallingly high lack of consideration for the immaturity of criminals?

The article doesn't say what the Iranian policy is or if there even is one. They suffer from that horribly regional and often flippant sharia law that often seems to be made up on the spot by unsupervised officials of dubious authority. It's like The Night the Lights Went Out in Georgia, except the lights have long been out.

"Don't trust your soul to no mud-hut, Baluchestan lawyer, 'cause the judge in the town's got blood stains on his hands."

[larry278]

03:22 PM on 05/06/2009

Iran is as bad as the USA for executing people convicted while they were minors.

[Wozzeck]

06:23 PM on 05/06/2009

The author conveniently omits the fact that the USA leads the world in juvenile executions during the last 10 years according to the American Bar Association.

[JerryLevy]

02:20 PM on 05/06/2009

During the Iranian revolution, the government executed thousands of political opponents, many without trial or after brief, secret trials. This practice continues today. Amnesty International is right to publicize this but unfortunately, they have been all too selective in the past. It took them 5 years to condemn suicide terrorism---one of the worst forms of genocide to occur in the 20th century.

[Spiritof1982]

07:04 PM on 05/06/2009

Jerry,

I'm not a fan of Iran's human rights scheme (or lack thereof, more like it). But I fail to see how this is genocide. It would be the equivalent of macro-level, population suicide for Iran to target its own youth for extermination. I think it's tragic but I don't really think it's genocide.

[JerryLevy]

10:51 PM on 05/06/2009

Strapping bombs to young people, mentally ill people and handicapped people and sending them into civilians to kill as many as possible is genocide in my mind. Look at the thousand of victims of suicide bombing in Iraq, Pakistan, Israel, World Trade Center, and the U.K.

[Mollabaji]

07:25 AM on 05/07/2009

JerryLevy,

Revolution ALWAYS eats its children, it is said. Iranian Revolution was no exception. Can you name a major revolution in history that during the first decade after it happened did not execute a large number of persons, many without trial?
You are jumping to invalid conclusion and condemnation due to your particular anti-Iranian bias.

[JerryLevy]

10:57 AM on 05/07/2009

Yes I can, all the revolutions in Eastern Europe came about with minimal or non-existent violence, the split up of Czechlovakia happened through an election and the Philippean revolution in the 1990s also came without much violence. In South Korea, they became a democracy and over threw the dictatorship without any violence. Though I take your point about most revolutions having a violent component but I view the Iranian revolution as particularly cruel.

[davidwayneosedach]

02:09 PM on 05/06/2009

A 4 year old child knows the difference between right and wrong. A 16 or 17 year old living in Iran knows that murder is wrong.

[Spiritof1982]

07:05 PM on 05/06/2009

Developmental psychology be damned! Davidwayneosedach has spoken!!!

[TheBlackCat]

07:52 AM on 05/07/2009

I'm 27, so I was 16 not TOO long ago. And let me tell you, I don't know what the heck I was doing half the time. It's not that you don't know the difference between right and wrong, you do. But you don't APPRECIATE the difference between right and wrong. That comes with growing up. A 4 year old does not have the same moral capacity or appreciation of the consequences of their actions.

For example, I never drove, I live in a city so use the subway and never needed a car. But I was with a big group of friends the other day, and everyone was talking about how when they first got their license, they used to drive 100 MPH like everywhere they went. Now, they're horrified that they used to do that, and marvel at their irresponsibility.

Kids don't have the same capacity to think and reason the way adults do. They just don't.

[finishcurve]

02:06 PM on 05/06/2009

Why would we have anything to say, when we routinely try kids as adults, put kids in adult prisons and execute the retarded?

We ought to put our own house in order, before we tell anyone else what to do.

[Wozzeck]

06:26 PM on 05/06/2009

The story serves an agenda. This is the author's genre, which is quite popular at this site.

[Spiritof1982]

07:06 PM on 05/06/2009

I disagree with this. I think that if you truly stand against capital punishment as a moral wrong, you do not have to wait for backward US policy to catch up to be credible.

[wereeverywhere]

01:17 AM on 05/07/2009

Oh come on Spirit get with it. It's tres chic to leave your critique at the US borders. I think it's supposed to show how radical one is by abandoning everyone else. Just say, sorry I'd like to help, but America did ____ or _____ so obviously you're on your own. And nine out of ten dictators agree.