SULAIMANI (ESTA) — Amnesty International said on Monday Iran had executed a Kurdish man charged with membership with an opposition group in defiance of international pressure.
Haider Qurbani was executed “secretly” in Sanandaj central prison on Sunday, according to Hengaw Organization for Human Rights.
Qurbani was denied any farewell between him and his family, according to Hengaw, which monitors human rights abuses in Iranian Kurdistan.
Qurbani alongside his wife’s brother Mahmoud Sadqy was detained in October 2016, the organization said.
He was sentenced to death in January 2021 for being a member of the Democratic Party of Iranian Kurdistan (PDKI), a Kurdish armed group seeking self-determination for Iran’s Kurdish minority.
U.N. human rights experts had in September urged Iran to repeal his death sentence over “serious concerns” that he did not receive a fair trial and was tortured during pre-trial detention.
Amnesty International also called for his life to be spared, saying there had been “numerous violations” in his “grossly unfair” trial, according to AFP.
“The case of Haidar Qurbani was so marred with flaws and lack of any credible evidence that the horror of his execution is heightened even further,” AFP quoted Amnesty’s Iran researcher Raha Bahreini as saying.
“This consolidates an alarming pattern of the Iranian authorities carrying out executions in secret or at short notice to minimize the chances of public and private interventions to save people’s lives,” she added.
“Haidar’s death is unlawful even under the Islamic Republic’s own rules.”
Amnesty said his case was still under consideration at the Supreme Court and his relatives were merely pointed towards his grave after it was carried out, AFP reported.
