Islamic Republic of Iran:
Surge in executions of women
Iran is a nervous, fumbling regime. Its strength primarily lies in its brutality against its own population, and funding and control over its proxies. By severely sanctioning Iran, Donald Trump managed to greatly diminish its strength.
Ever since the mass protests over the death of Mahsa Amini nearly two years ago, following Iran’s morality police detaining her for not wearing her hijab properly and murdering her, the regime has been threatened to its very foundations from within. Now Iran is renewing its crackdown on women via a surge in executions. As usual, the charges are often trumped up. Back in April, Iran executed 853 people in a so-called “war on drugs.”
The purpose of Iran’s renewed surge in executions is to instill fear and terror into Iranian women, so that they will passively accept the dictates of the government, and to deter any uprising, especially now, given Iran’s proxy war with Israel. The last thing Iran needs at this moment is domestic turbulence.
Rising Number Of Iranian Women Sentenced To Death Amid Surge In Executions
by Kian Sharifi and Diako Alavi, Radio Free Europe, September 1, 2024:
What do an Iranian aid worker, a labor activist, a political campaigner, and a protester have in common?
All four are women who have been charged in Iran with armed rebellion against the state — which carries the death sentence — in recent months.
Two of them — aid worker Pakhshan Azizi and labor activist Sharifeh Mohammadi — have already been sentenced to death. Political activist Varisheh Moradi and protester Nasim Gholami Simiyari are awaiting their sentences.
Besides Simiyari, all the women have been accused of being members of opposition Kurdish groups outside Iran. Azizi and Moradi are both members of Iran’s Kurdish minority, which has long been suppressed.
There has been a rise in the number of women sentenced to death and executed since unprecedented antiestablishment protests erupted in 2022 following the death in custody of Mahsa Amini, an Iranian-Kurdish woman.
Fear Of Execution
Mohammadi, the labor activist, was sentenced to death in July. She was accused of membership in an independent labor union and a banned Kurdish separatist group based in neighboring Iraq’s semi-autonomous Kurdish region.
Her family has said she was not affiliated with any political organization inside or outside the country.
Pakistan: Advocate for minority rights shares poem
opposing rape, gets arrested for insulting Allah
Asma Batool’s mistake was that she quoted a poem that referred to many gods, rather than insisting that there is no god but Allah. For that, she could be imprisoned or even killed. As far as Pakistani authorities are concerned, upholding the singularity of Allah is more important than human life, and certainly more important than opposing rape.
Pakistani blogger shares poem on rapes. Gets arrested for insulting Allah
by Debdutta Chakraborty, The Print, August 28, 2024 (thanks to The Religion of Peace):
New Delhi: All it took was a poem of solidarity for a Pakistani blogger to be charged with blasphemy and be put in jail. Asma Batool, a blogger from Pakistan-occupied Kashmir shared a poem by Salman Haider on the harassment women face in South Asian countries, after the Kolkata rape case.
“Khuda, Bhagwan or Ishwar, sab maujood they, jab rape hua (All the gods were witness when I was being violated), read the poem that Batool shared on Facebook. In an Instagram post, she is seen narrating another poem with the caption, “Your country is the same as mine”.
Now the police have picked her up on charges of blasphemy after religious clerics filed an FIR against her for insulting Allah. The FIR was filed against her on 25 August by Maulana Tahir Bashir, president of Ahlus Sunnat Wal Jamaat District in Poonch. Batool’s family has now filed a complaint with the local police, alleging that a mob attacked their home, threatened to kill them, and attempted to set their house on fire over accusations of abandoning their faith.
Visuals on social media also show a mob led by local clerics asking her family to disown Batool or face social ostracism….
Batool has actively raised her voice against the oppression of minorities in Pakistan on social media. Her YouTube channel has videos of her celebrating Holi and talking about the people of Kashmir….
Pakistan’s blasphemy laws, which ban derogatory remarks about the Prophet Muhammad and can lead to severe penalties, have sparked significant controversy. Since 1947, at least 89 people have been extrajudicially killed over blasphemy accusations, including notable figures like Governor Salman Taseer and Minister Shahbaz Bhatti.
As of early 2021, around 80 people were imprisoned on blasphemy charges, with many facing life sentences or the death penalty….
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