A Political Prisoner Sentenced to Death on Charges of Blasphemy by the Iranian Court
Hengaw, Monday, April 1, 2024
Shahriar Bayat, a political prisoner and one of the detainees during the Woman, Life, Freedom (Jin, Jiyan, Azadi) movement, has been sentenced to death for "blasphemy" charges by the judicial system of the Islamic Republic of Iran. Previously sentenced to 18 years in prison in another case, he has spent nearly a year and six months in detention.
According to a report received by the Hengaw Organization for Human Rights, Shahriar Bayat, a 64-year-old prisoner from Shahriar County in Tehran Province, has been sentenced to death by Branch 13 of the Criminal Court of Tehran Province for insulting the prophet of Islam (blasphemy).
The aforementioned sentence was issued based on the publication of images and posts on social media by Shahriar Bayat and according to reports from the Tehran Province Intelligence Department regarding interrogations and the content of this individual’s mobile phone.
In the issuance of the death sentence for Shahriar Bayat, Saeed Sharafati and Ali Taghian, advisors to the Criminal Court, rejected Bayat’s “repentance” and voted in favor of the death sentence, while another advisor to the court, Abolghasem Morad Taleb, deemed his imprisonment sufficient.
Furthermore, according to a post published by Arash Sadeghi on his X account, Shahriar Bayat received a 10-year prison sentence for forming an organization, 5 years for participating in riots, 2 years for insulting Khamenei and Khomeini, and 1 year for propaganda against the government, totaling 18 years of imprisonment. Based on Sadeghi’s post, he was cellmates with Shahriar Bayat in Ward 209 of Evin Prison for a while. The post continues, “During interrogations, several images and posts were attributed to him on social media, which he denied, stating he had not produced any content nor had any connection to these pages.”
Shahriar Bayat was arrested in Shahriar County (Tehran Province) during the Woman, Life, Freedom movement by Ministry of Intelligence forces on Wednesday, October 25, 2022, and was later transferred to Tehran Central Prison and ultimately to Ghezel Hessar Prison in Karaj.
