Is Iran going to execute its protestors?

Are protestors in Iran going to be sentenced to death? Reports that 227 members of the Iranian parliament had signed a statement declaring the protestors ‘enemies of God’ and calling for them to be executed went viral this week. The story managed to elicit a wave of condemnation across social media, the wider press and even led to Canadian prime minister Justin Trudeau condemning the regime’s ‘barbaric decision’ to kill the protestors.  

But after the widespread attention the story garnered, some began to question the validity of the claims, especially the assertion that the deputies had called for the ‘execution’ of all those who had been incarcerated during the recent protests, estimated at around 15,000, many of them young adults. The story was soon labelled as either at best a dangerous embellishment or at worst ‘fake news’ concocted to generate a justification for the West to declare war against Iran – a tendentious claim in itself. 

What seems to have been missed is that the execution claim was also made in the Iranian press. The centrist newspaper Shargh – not generally known to engage in hyperbole – likewise reported on 14 November that 227 deputies had signed a statement declaring the protestors to be ‘Enemies of God’ (mohareb) and calling for their execution. At first sight this looked like a traditional exercise in political exuberance by the deputies – a way of declaring their loyalty to the regime and exhorting the judiciary to take all possible ‘retributive justice’ against the protestors.  

Nobody appears to be claiming that the legislature has the ability itself to condemn the protestors to death – it was the sentiment and encouragement that mattered. In a political system in which the judiciary is far from independent and where ‘due process’ is wanting, these kinds of exhortations are not without significance. At the very least the regime was sending a message to the protestors that the regime was resolute, and they would face the harshest penalties.  

The popular reaction to the move, however, appears to have surprised the deputies who demanded that Shargh clarify the situation. The paper printed the deputies’ response without further comment (and interestingly, no further action appears to have been taken against the paper). In their response the deputies said that Shargh had contributed to a ‘big lie’ and that the statement had not mentioned ‘execution’ but had instead used the term ‘qisas’, (retributive justice), which is nonetheless reserved for capital offences. The letter noted that the parliament has no authority to pass judgments, had not referred to everyone as ‘enemies of God’, and that their call was limited to those who the judiciary believed had blood on their hands – who they compared to ‘Daesh’ (Isis). The letter did not deny though that the original statement – with these qualifications – had been issued. 

The problem for the regime is that even with these ‘qualifications’ the demand remains a serious cause for concern. Death sentences are already being issued with an alacrity all too common in the Iranian penal system. And, of course, the death penalty is a form of retributive justice widely – and indeed excessively – used in the country. In any context parliamentary deputies exhorting the judiciary to apply the maximum penalty to wrongdoers would be odd – in Iran it is positively sinister and to pretend otherwise is to miss the point.  

Iranians are all too well aware of the historical precedent and the ease with which the regime has branded protestors as ‘heretics’ and ‘apostates’, terms that deprive them of what limited rights they might have. And, of course, they will be disturbingly aware of the summary execution of some 4,000 prisoners in 1988, a crime which the current President Raisi, as a judicial official, was intimately involved. In short, while Iran’s parliament cannot sentence the protestors to death, its call to the judiciary is a disturbing move that should be taken seriously in the West.