Iranian human rights activists have denounced the continued imprisonment of two men arrested during last year’s nationwide protests despite being granted bail.
The pair are among eight jailed defendants in the so-called Ekbatan case who are being held in Karaj’s Qezelhesar prison, near Tehran.
The eight accused include Milad Armon, Alireza Kafaei, Amir Mohammad Khosh Iqbal, Alireza Bermarz Pournak, Seyyed Mohammad Mehdi Hosseini, Hossein Nemati, Mehdi Imani and Navid Najaran.
“Branch 13 of the Criminal Court of Tehran province approved the temporary release on bail of two of these individuals,” a source told the HRANA human rights website.
However, Branch 15 of the Tehran Revolutionary Court, headed by the notorious Judge Abolqasem Salavati, opposed the move and personally requested to handle the case, the source said.
The eight defendants are among more than 50 young people living in Tehran’s Ekbatan Town who were arrested in November 2022 following the death of a member of the paramilitary Basij force.
Indictments were issued for 14 of those arrested.
In May of this year, the judiciary announced that three of them faced charges of “waging war against God through the use of cold weapons and actions against national security.” The charge can carry a death sentence.
The monthslong protests sparked by Mahsa Amini’s death in police custody in September 2022 were brutally put down by Iranian security forces.
More than 500 people were killed in the repression and over 20,000 were unlawfully detained.
Following biased trials, the judiciary has handed down stiff sentences, including the death penalty, to protesters. At least eight of them have been executed so far.
Source » iranwire