Iran hangs two men accused of killing a security agent during protests

Jan 7 (Reuters) – Iran hanged two men on Saturday for allegedly killing a member of the security forces during protests that followed the death of Mahsa Aminia 22-year-old Iranian Kurdish girl, drawing condemnation from the European Union (EU), the United States and other Western countries.

The two men executed on Saturday had been found guilty of killing a member of the Basij paramilitary militia. Three others have been sentenced to death for the same case and 11 received prison terms.

“Mohammad Mehdi Karami and Seyyed Mohammad Hosseini, the main perpetrators of the crime that led to the unjust martyrdom of Ruhollah Ajamian, were hanged this morning,” the judiciary said in a statement picked up by the official IRNA news agency.

The latest executions bring to four the number of protesters officially executed after the riots that began after Amini’s death on 16 September.

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The head of diplomacy of the European Union on Saturday condemned the executions and called on Iran to immediately stop carrying out death sentences against protesters and annul existing ones.

“This is yet another example of the violent repression of civil demonstrations by the Iranian authorities,” Josep Borrell said in a statement.

The French Foreign Ministry called the executions “disgusting” and urged the Iranian authorities to address the “legitimate aspirations of the Iranian people.”

Amnesty International said last month that the Iranian authorities are seeking the death penalty for at least 26 other people in what it called “sham trials designed to intimidate protesters.”

Mahsa Amini died in custody after being detained by the morality police enforcing the Islamic Republic’s mandatory dress code laws. The protests that followed represent one of the biggest challenges to the Islamic Republic since its creation in 1979.

(Additional reporting by Gilles Guillaume in ParisEdited in Spanish by Javier López de Lérida)