Janice R. Andrews
In a startling turn of events, mentally ill Iranian demonstrator Mohammad Ghobadlou is scheduled to be killed on Tuesday for his claimed role in the killing of a local official during Iran’s 2022 major protests. His attorney, Amir Raesian, issued the declaration, stating that he was notified by the Tehran General and Revolutionary Court that the execution date was set for January 23, 2024.
Two years ago, Iranian judge Abolqasem Salavati—who the US had previously sanctioned for imposing severe penalties on political prisoners, journalists, and activists—sent Ghobadlou a death sentence. Despite Ghobadlou’s acknowledged mental condition, Amnesty International harshly condemned the death sentences, calling the proceedings “grossly unfair sham trials” characterised by forced confessions and a lack of thorough mental health exams.
Iranian authorities claim that in September 2022, during a protest in the region of Robat Karim, Tehran, Ghobadlou ran over a local official. According to Amnesty International, he was given two death sentences: the first was imposed on November 16, 2022, for “corruption on earth” by a Revolutionary Court and was affirmed by the Supreme Court the following month. At the end of December 2022, a criminal court in the province of Tehran handed down the second death sentence for “murder.”
Amnesty International notes that since she was fifteen years old, Ghobadlou has been under the care of a mental health facility for bipolar disorder. The death sentence is expressly forbidden by international law and norms to be applied against those who have mental illnesses.
The government’s response on nationwide protests in 2022, which were sparked by the death of 22-year-old Mahsa Amini while in the care of the nation’s morality police, is linked to the spike in executions in Iran, including the case of Ghobadlou. Human rights organisations claim that the government’s violent suppression of the movement was part of a larger scheme to “instill fear” in anti-regime demonstrators.
