PARIS: Iranian killed “celebrating” US World Cup defeatRights groups reported on Wednesday that security forces shot and killed an Iranian man who was celebrating the United States’ elimination of his country’s World Cup team.
On Tuesday night, Iran’s arch-enemy the United States eliminated it from the World Cup in Qatar, eliciting a mixed reaction from supporters of the regime and those who oppose it.
A bloody government crackdown on more than two months of protests sparked by Mahsa Amini’s death in custody had dissuaded many from supporting the national team.
Human rights groups claim that 27-year-old Mehran Samak was shot dead after honking his car horn in Bandar Anzali, a city on the Caspian Sea coast northwest of Tehran. According to the Oslo-based group Iran Human Rights (IHR), Samak “was targeted directly and shot in the head by security forces following the defeat of the national team against the United States.”
Additionally, the Center for Human Rights in Iran (CHRI), based in New York, reported that the security forces had killed him while he was celebrating. It shared a video it shot at his funeral on Wednesday in Tehran, where mourners could be heard yelling, “Death to the dictator.”
One of the most prominent slogans of the protests that erupted following Amini’s death in custody on September 16 is the chant directed at Iran’s supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei.
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Court upholds death penalty
According to IHR, the crackdown on the protests has resulted in the deaths of at least 448 people, including 60 children under the age of 18 and 29 women.
The judiciary reported that the supreme court of Iran on Wednesday upheld the death penalty for four men who were accused of working with the intelligence services of Israel, Iran’s arch-enemy.
According to the judiciary’s Mizan Online website, the four were given the death penalty for “their intelligence cooperation with the Zionist regime (Israel) and kidnapping,” and there was no opportunity for appeal.
It gave the men’s names as “Hossein Ordoukhanzadeh,” “Shahin Imani Mahmoudabad,” “Milad Ashrafi Atbatan,” and “Manouchehr Shahbandi Bojandi,” but did not go into detail about their pasts.
According to Mizan Online, three additional defendants were given sentences ranging from five to ten years for crimes against the nation’s security, complicity in kidnapping, and possession of weapons.
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Iran and Israel have taken part in a years-in-length shadow battle, with the Islamic republic blaming its curve enemy for completing damage assaults against its atomic destinations and the deaths of key figures, including researchers.
The Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps announced on May 22 that it had detained individuals who belonged to “a network acting under the direction of the Israeli intelligence service.”
A Guards statement at the time stated, “These people committed theft, destruction of personal and public property, kidnapping, and extortion of false confessions.”
Iran reported the arrest of Mossad-linked agents toward the end of July, claiming that the individuals belonged to a banned Kurdish rebel group that planned to target “sensitive sites.”
After more than two months of protests sparked by Mahsa Amini’s death while being held in custody, the most recent court decision comes at a time when tensions are rising in Iran.
Following her arrest in Tehran on suspicion of violating the Islamic Republic of Iran’s dress code for women, the 22-year-old Iranian of Kurdish descent passed away on September 16.
