On Friday family of Ali Mahin-Torabi once again asked Stop Child Executions Campaign for help with the grim news that Ali may be executed this week. Nazanin Afshin-Jam Immediately talked to Ali's attorney, Mohammad Mustafaei who had no such information and promised to review the file on the first Iranian working day (Saturday)
We also learned that after finding out about Ali's internet blog, Iran's prison officials searched Ali's prison cell and found his mobile phone under the mattress. After beating Ali , he was taken to solitary confinement for few days without any visitation and communication rights with his family.
On Sunday night mother of Ali Mahin-Torabi also told the SCE campaign coordinator that they have privately discovered that Ali's appeal which was sent for superior court's review was denied and subsequently sent to the department in charge of executions. This is despite that the official denial by the court authorities when Ali's attorney inquired about Ali's case on Saturday. However according to private sources who have seen Ali's file, Ali Mahin-Torabi is already scheduled to be executed this Wednesday or Saturday.
According to direct order by Iran's head of judiciary, Ayatollah Shahrudi all the child executions must be signed and approved by him (Estizan) and it seems like even if Ali's appeal may have been denied, the execution probably has not been authorized by Ayatollah Sharudi yet. What seems to be troubling is that the Ali's file should not have been sent to department of executions until after Shahrudi's signature although Ali's execution seem to have been scheduled already!.
Last week Makwan Moludzadeh was executed despite direct order from Ayatollah Shahrudi that his file requires further review. Also two months ago a man was stonned to death despite order by Shahrudi not to do so.
What seems to be obvious is that the human life is of no value to leaders and judiciary of Islamic Regime because of their reluctance to make child executions illegal and their lack of care about Iran's own legal due process when it comes to killing children. Iran's regime in 2007 has been on a new record of killing spree of Iranian children (under 18) and young generation (20's and 30's) . Iran's majority population is consisted of those under the age of 30, a generation who wants change and the mass public executions seem to be intended to create an atmosphere of fear among the Iranian youth.
Stop Child Executions Campaign has already notified Amnesty International and International Committee against executions about Ali's possible execution this week and is in process of contacting others. At this point the only hope for Ali seem to be a direct order by Iran's supreme leader (Ayatollah Khamenei) and head of judiciary of Islamic regime; Ayatollah Shahrudi.
We call on all international human rights organizations and governments to immediately contact offices of Ayatollah Khamenei and Sharudi and demand an immediate stop to execution of Ali Mahin-Torabi.
We also call on everyone to contact their parliament and government leaders as well as other organizations.
Next week may be too late.
Leader of the Islamic Republic
Ayatollah Sayed Ali Khamenei The Office of the Supreme Leader
Islamic Republic Street - Shahid Keshvar Doust Street
Tehran Islamic Republic of Iran
Email: info@leader.ir
Salutation: Your Excellency
Head of the Judiciary Ayatollah Mahmoud Hashemi Shahroudi Ministry of Justice, Ministry of Justice Building , Panzdah-Khordad Square Tehran Islamic Republic of Iran Email: info@dadgostary-tehran.ir (In the subject line write: FAO Ayatollah Shahroudi) Salutation: Your Excellency
According to an email sent by one of Ali Mahin-Torabi's family members - Although Ali was scheduled to be hanged along with 11 others who were recently executed, he was not taken with them for execution by the Iranian authorities.
Ali is accused of murder of another youth at the age of 16. However, Ali has denied the charges.
In the email, one of Ali's family members stated that the coroner has told Ali's attorney that he will soon be provided with a document which could prove that the murder was not pre-meditated and possibly someone else was the cause. Ali's family thanked their family friend Azarin Sadegh for her efforts to help save Ali Mahin-Torabi.
Azarin in response wrote "I had goose bumps when I read your email with these great news. I couldn't believe that it is really happening. But still I felt a kind of mix feeling. I feel a deep sense of relief and happiness because Ali seems to be safe now and I hope that he will see the end of this dark and long tunnel very soon. And at the same time the news about other 11 people executed is difficult to hear. ......On another note, about your exaggeration of what I have done for Ali, I truly think it is overstatement. All I did was doing a little bit of web surfing and writing a bunch of emails and articles. The real job is done by these wonderful organizations: StopChildExecutions and Amnesty International. You shouldn't stop thanking them!"
Azarin recently wrote: Since a few weeks I have been trying to help Ali Mahin Torabi. The day I started this effort, I had no hope and Ali's family was pretty certain that he had no real chance and it was already too late. So everyone was certain that he was going to get executed at the end of Ramadan. Yet, I wrote an article and I sent hundreds of emails. The organization that responded first to my email was StopChildExecutions founded by Nazanin. Not only they sent their lawyer to help with Ali's case (It is a fact confirmed by Ali's family), but also they contacted Amnesty International. Later, I found the email address of a spokesman for Amnesty International and contacted him and he told me that they were already aware of his case (guess by who?) and they are working on making the case part of their Urgent Actions calls. Last week European Union and Amnesty International, both released letter and press releases addressed to Iranian government to urge them to save Ali's life. There is a new petition to sign on Amnesty International site that is their campaign to save him by sending letters to Iranian authorities. .....Ali's family was interviewed by Reuters and the report of his ordeal has been spread throughout internet. Since that day Ali (who had already accepted to die young) has finally found some light in his heart and his mother feels less desperate. His family doesn't stop sending me their prayers and their gratitude for all these organizations that worked so hard to make it happen,..."
Also in an email to SCE Azarin Sadegh wrote: Wow! It is great news! Thank you David, Thank you Nazanin! Last night I made a simple Google search on Ali's name and the number of results found was 18,500! Isn't it incredible? I remember the first time I did the same search before you have got involved in it, the number was just a two digits number.Thank you so much for your amazing efforts. I am sure Ali has a much better chance of survival now......I am so impressed by your strength of character in pursuing the case for each of these kids . ...."
Nazanin Afshin-Jam and Stop Child Executions Campaign wish to THANK the following for your efforts to save Ali from the scheduled execution:
Azarin Sadegh, SCE volunteers and supporters, Amnesty International and its supporters, European Union, International Committee Against Executions, Swedish Parliament members, iranian.com and many other bloggers and websites and 100's of people who responded to our's and amnesty international's urgent pleas to write to Iranian authorities.
At the same time we would like to remind everyone that although the scheduled execution was canceled, Ali Mahin-Torabi still remains at danger of execution until his case is reconsidered .
Amnesty International UK has made a petition letter addressed to spiritual leader of Islamic regime in Iran to to help save Ali Mahin-Torabi from execution.
Please sign the pettition at the bottom of the page :
Last week an email was sent to Nazanin Afshin-Jam from an Iranian girl by the name Azarin asking Nazanin to help a friend of her whose young nephew was facing execution in Iran. No name or information was given at the time, so we asked for more detail information which was sent to us by the family member. It was only then that we realized that the boy's name is Ali Mahin-Torabi who was already listed in Stop Child Executions Petition. In the past few day we have posted more information about Ali's situation and also have contacted Amnesty International, International Committe Against Executions and Iranian Attorney Mostafaei who has already met Ali in prison and taken his case. This is an essay about Ali Mahin-Torabi that Azarin sent us today:
By Azarin A. Sadegh
Today my friend in Iran called me. She told me about the imminent execution of Ali Mahin Torabi, her nephew. He’s 21 years old, and he has been declared guilty of a murder he hasn’t committed. He has spent the last five years of his life—since he was 16 years old--in a prison, waiting for his execution. After his arrest, if Ali hadn’t protected his friends by taking the blame, or if he had a rich family, or if his father had better connections, and if there was a true justice system in Iran based on the Justice and the Truth, maybe he wouldn’t have been where he is now. Still during these five years in prison, Ali studied hard to get his high school diploma and now he has also the responsibility of their library’s computer systems.
He is still full of life and hope but my friend sounded so desperate.
She asked me to help Ali.
I write this with that task weighing heavily upon my shoulders. Where to begin?
I searched the Internet and was stunned to learn there are at least another 80 children in the same situation as Ali—young people waiting to be executed for crimes they allegedly committed when they were minors. One on this sinister list is a 13-year-old girl.
I stare in horror at the images on the internet of countless public hangings. In the crowds watching this vision of horror, stand children, and all I can think about is what lessons they are learning. They stare at the soulless eyes of an alleged criminal, the one who will, in just one second, become a victim. Then I find another image: a hanged woman in black chador dancing in the air; the figure is imposing and sinister, and isolated. It’s as if this picture belongs to another place, another race, another dimension. It’s as if time has stopped, and all humanity is linked through one hanged woman’s despair.
My mind drifts.
No, I think. I don’t need to look at this image. I don’t need to write this nightmare. Why should I write such a story? This is a vision I don’t want to see. These are words I don’t want to read. There is this crushing silence I don’t want to break.
I think: There is this truth I don’t dare defy.
The weight on my shoulders grows heavier....still more.
Should I contact humanitarian organizations? Should I send letters and emails? Should I make phone calls?
What can I actually achieve?
I am not in Iran. I am not a lawyer. I have no important connections. I am nobody. What can I do other than write about Ali who sits awaiting execution for a crime he did not commit, who has sat there, among so many others, for so many years?
How am I supposed to tell his story?
This story should stab, Kafka wrote.
That means Ali’s story should shock and awaken. That means I should dream about it, over and over and over again. That means I should change and change again my wording to hone the piece until it is pure perfection. That means I should fall asleep every night repeating this same story, to find the exact place of each word in the flow of my narration. Each word has to be where it should be. My story must reveal the randomness of this cruelty, and I must mention hope, and yes, even love. I know I have to please all those who read it and move those who have never cared—not for innocents hanged, not for young men and women in Iran, not for others. I know I must convey impossible empathy, and I must do this only with my words and even through the blank gaps between words. I must push you, my reader, to read on and at the same time make the reading of Ali’s fate harder and harder to bear. So you will suffer alongside Ali who sits alone in his cell, imagining a rope, imagining a hand, imagining the void beneath his feet - for the one millionth time.
It is how, all of us, we will never leave this moment, this moment of a man’s tangible sorrow.
It is how we will share his futureless existence; we will believe his beliefs and we will sink in the pool of his despair. We are going to belong to that place, to that hanging place, where we will turn into Ali.
But maybe for once, only this time, we will not shut our mouths out of fright. For once, we will be united - no matter where we come from, and we will shout and scream: “Stop it. Stop the execution of Ali. Stop the execution of children in Iran.”
But? How? How do I begin to tell this story?
How is it going to end?
How will my writing save Ali?
**********
Please visit www.stopchildexecutions.com to read more about children facing execution and to sign a petition.
Ali Mahin-Torabi is another youth who was sentenced to death for murdering another youth, Mazdak Khodadadian, during an argument in Bani Hashemi High School in February 2003. According to Ali's testimony, he did not know Mazdak had been stabbed until he heard shouting from the crowd that had gathered around them.
A Juvenile Court in city of Karaj (near Tehran) sentenced Ali Mohin-Torabi to qisas on October 30, 2003. Branch 27 of the Supreme Court upheld the sentence on June 8, 2004. In cases of Qisas sharia law, the family of the murdered have the options of demanding execution of the accsued, demand Diyeh retribution (blood money) or pardon the accused. In this case Mazdak's mother demanded blood money, but if the father pays the requested amount to the mother, Ali Mahin-Torabi's will get executed.
International Committe Against Executions, had initially reported that Ali's death sentence was approved by Iran's head of judiciary Ayatollah Sharudi. Stop Child Executions Campaign contacted attorney Mohammad Mostafaie in Iran. Mr. Mostafaei immediately met Ali in prison and took his case. We were also informed that the case had been sent to Ayatollah Shahrudi but he did not order the final execution order (Estizan) and instead ordered that the the matter attempted to be resolved by arbitration. If the arbitration fails and Mazdak's father does not settle , Ali's execution will be carried out. Ali Mahin-Torabi is now in Reja’i Shahr prison in Karaj.
Nazanin Afshin-Jam and Stop Child Executions Campaign strongly condemn the pending execution of Ali Mahin-Torabi and demands an immediate halt to carrying Ali's execution verdict.
We also demand the Iranian parliament and judiciary as well as the supreme leader of Islamic regime in Iran Ayatollah Khamenei and Ayatollah Shahrudi , the head of Iran's judiciary to immediately implement the letter of the 55 Iranian attorneys and human rights advocates last week who demanded an immediate halt to all child executions and a speedy approval of the parliamentary bill to permanently prohibit execution of minors.
RECOMMENDED ACTION: Please send appeals to arrive as quickly as possible, in Persian, Arabic, English or your own language:
- expressing concern that Ali Pak-Mihan is at risk of execution for a crime committed when he was under 18;
- calling on the authorities to halt the planned execution of Ali Mahin-Torabi immediately, and commute his death sentence;
- reminding the authorities that Iran is a state party to the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights and the Convention on the Rights of the Child, which prohibit the use of the death penalty against people convicted of crimes committed when they were under 18, and that the execution of Ali Pak-Mihan would therefore be a violation of international law;
- urging the authorities to pass legislation to abolish the death penalty for offences committed by anyone under the age of 18, so as to bring Iran’s domestic law into line with its obligations under international law;
- stating that you acknowledges the right and responsibility of governments to bring to justice to those suspected of criminal offences, but unconditionally opposes their death penalty.
SEND APPEALS TO:
Leader of the Islamic Republic His Excellency Ayatollah Sayed ‘Ali KhameneiThe Office of the Supreme Leader Islamic Republic StreetShahid Keshvar Doust StreetTehran, Islamic Republic of Iran Email: info@leader.ir Salutation: Your ExcellencyHead of the JudiciaryAyatollah Mahmoud Hashemi ShahroudiMinistry of Justice, Ministry of Justice Building ,Panzdah-Khordad SquareTehran, Islamic Republic of IranEmail: info@dadgostary-tehran.ir (In the subject line write: FAO Ayatollah Shahroudi)Salutation: Your Excellency
COPIES TO:
PresidentHis Excellency Mahmoud AhmadinejadThe Presidency, Palestine Avenue, Azerbaijan Intersection, Tehran, Islamic Republic of IranEmail: dr-ahmadinejad@president.irvia website: www.president.ir/emailand to diplomatic representatives of Iran accredited to your country.PLEASE SEND APPEALS IMMEDIATELY.
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