Tehran Prosecutor: Death Sentence Issued for ISIS Member

On Tuesday, November 7, the Tehran prosecutor announced that a death sentence had been issued for a "member" of the Islamic State (ISIS) and stated that 23 individuals "related" to the group's attack on the Iranian Parliament had been identified and arrested. According to the state news agency IRNA, Abbas Jafari Dolatabadi did not provide further details about the arrests, and it is unclear when they took place. He also stated, without elaborating, that the death sentence for a "member" of ISIS had been confirmed by the Supreme Court. The Tehran prosecutor did not provide any information regarding the charges against this individual or the timing of their arrest. Iranian security and judicial officials have reported the arrest of dozens of individuals affiliated with ISIS in various regions of Iran following the attacks on June 7 against the Parliament and the mausoleum of Ayatollah Khomeini in Tehran. On June 7, the Parliament building and the mausoleum were targeted in two simultaneous attacks, for which ISIS claimed responsibility shortly thereafter. Seventeen people were killed and over 50 were injured in this attack. The Iranian Ministry of Intelligence announced the names of the deceased attackers as Ramin, Qayyum, Fereydoun, Abu Jihad, and Saryas, without providing their last names. Meanwhile, some websites and the Fars news agency reported that the individual identified as Saryas had a Facebook page, and his full name was Saryas Sadeqi. The Kurdistan Democratic Party's website, led by Khalid Azizi, had mentioned Saryas Sadeqi in 2014 as someone who promoted ISIS in Paveh, Kurdistan, Iran. Iranian security sources also reported the arrest of an Iranian woman who allegedly played a role in "guiding" the attackers of the mausoleum of Ayatollah Khomeini. However, security officials have not commented on the name or status of this individual. The Tehran prosecutor also stated that several women whose husbands had joined ISIS had been arrested. According to Abbas Jafari Dolatabadi, these women had traveled to Syria with their husbands and "after the ISIS group was pushed back from Syrian territory, they were forced to return to Iran." He stated that most of these women's husbands had been arrested or killed. The Tehran prosecutor mentioned that the arrested women were also "employed by this group for payment and during their arrest, significant amounts of money were discovered from them." The Tehran prosecutor did not specify the number of these women. Previously, Iranian security officials had reported the arrest of individuals who allegedly intended to join ISIS. In his remarks, the Tehran prosecutor also acknowledged that during the broadcast of the trials of those accused of the 2009 presidential election protests, Article 188 of the Criminal Procedure Code was not adhered to. According to civil law, the publication of materials and non-public trials is prohibited. Several political activists and protesters from the 2009 presidential election were tried in public courts during the summer of that year, and the sessions of these trials were broadcast on Iranian television. These trials were held without a jury, and the defendants were denied access to lawyers after several months in solitary confinement. Some of the individuals tried later stated that their statements in court were made under duress from prolonged and severe torture. For instance, Abdollah Momeni, spokesperson for the Office for Consolidating Unity, wrote in a letter to the Supreme Leader of the Islamic Republic detailing the "tortures" he endured, including "insults and abuse, severe beatings, attempts to suffocate him to the point of unconsciousness, holding a prisoner's head in a toilet bowl, solitary confinement for 86 days, repeated threats of execution, threats of sexual assault, and being forced by interrogators to practice for fabricated confessions." Abbas Jafari Dolatabadi's statements about the cessation of public trial broadcasts come at a time when Iranian television has continued to air numerous videos of forced confessions from defendants since 2009.