May 13
IRAN:
Too little, too late -- Afsaneh Norouzis death sentence and pardon
There is no criminal justice system in the world that can claim
infallibility in determining guilt or innocence. However, in any
democratic society, the justice system must make every effort to ensure
fairness. A justice system must not only strive to be accurate, but must
also recognize its imperfections and account for them. This means that it
must allow for the possibility of error by admitting them when they are
found and by compensating the innocent.
The 36-year-old Iranian woman, Afsaneh Norouzi, who was recently spared
the death penalty and finally released from prison, deserved her freedom
and her right to life. But, like her unfair trial that resulted in her
wrongful capital murder conviction, her "too little, too late" pardon was
also grossly unfair and offered no compensation whatsoever for the litany
of injustice she has endured since her detention 8 years ago.
Afsaneh Norouzi was arrested on 10 July 1997 in Tehran along with her
husband, Mostafa Jahangiri, three days after the body of Behzad Aghdam
Moghadam was found in his duplex villa in Kish Island, a vacation and free
trade zone in southern Iran. Behzad Aghdam Moghadam's bare naked body was
found stabbed in his children's bedroom. His penis was partially cut off.
Bloodied walls and disarray suggested a struggle. The police immediately
suspected a sex-related killing. Less than a month later, five detectives
and forensic experts confirmed that the killing was an act of self-defense
against rape by a woman. By then, Afsaneh Norouzi, an incommunicado
detainee in police custody, had also repeatedly confessed to stabbing
Behzad Aghdam Moghadam with kitchen knives to protect herself from rape.
A high-ranking security and intelligence official, Behzad Aghdam Moghadam
was a powerful figure in Kish Island. It is said that he also made a lot
of money by importing cement and called himself "the Commander of Kish".
Mostafa Jahangiri, a jeweler by occupation, became friends with him seven
years earlier when he ran a jewelry shop together with Moghadam's uncle.
They eventually lost the business and, as a result, Mostafa Jahangiri and
his family were homeless for a long time. Then, Behzad Aghdam Moghadam
invited them to Kish, ostensibly to help them financially. He promised to
use his influence to buy duty-free goods so that Mostafa Jahangiri could
earn a commission by transferring them to Tehran.
Mostafa Jahangiri, his wife, Afsaneh Norouzi, and two children,
nine-year-old daughter Mahdieh and five-year-old son Mohammad, arrived at
Behzad Aghdam Moghadam's villa on 1 July 1997. Once there, they found out
that Behzad Aghdam Moghadam's wife and children had gone to Tehran. Four
days later, on Friday afternoon, when Behzad Aghdam Moghadam had just sent
Mostafa Jahangiri off to Tehran with goods, he undressed and lunged at
Afsaneh Norouzi in his children's bedroom. That was his 1st unsuccessful
attempt to rape Afsaneh Norouzi. Drawn upstairs by her mother's struggling
sounds, the nine-year-old Mahdieh scared him off.
Thereafter, Behzad Aghdam Moghadam used violence, humiliation, harassment
and financial inducements to force Afsaneh Norouzi to have sex with him. A
penniless stranger in Kish, Afsaneh Norouzi could not flee the house or go
to the police. When Mostafa Jahangiri was leaving for Tehran, Behzad
Aghdam Moghadam prevented him from giving her money insisting that he
"would take care of all their needs" and the police were his friends or
colleagues. But she did everything else possible to protect herself: at
night, she vigilantly stayed awake with her children sleeping next to her;
in the evening, she took her children to the beach and stayed there until
dark and, despite not having her own phone, she managed to call her
husband with Behzad Aghdam Moghadam's mobile and told him to return
immediately.
Then, on Sunday, while Mostafa Jahangiri was returning by plane, Behzad
Aghdam Moghadam again attempted to rape Afsaneh Norouzi. This time she
defended herself with two kitchen knives she had previously hidden in the
bedroom.
When Mostafa Jahangiri arrived from the airport, he found Afsaneh Norouzi
traumatized and injured, "her right fingers almost dangling from her
hand". His children were weeping. Fearing the consequences of getting
arrested in Kish, they decided to go back to Tehran. But, expecting a
payment and their return plane tickets from Behzad Aghdam Moghadam,
Mostafa Jahangiri had no money either. They broke into Behzad Aghdam
Moghadam's briefcase and took the amount of money they needed to buy plane
tickets for Tehran. Until their arrest 3 days later, neither of them knew
that Behzad Aghdam Moghadam had died.
Immediately following their arrest in Tehran, Afsaneh Norouzi confessed to
stabbing Behzad Aghdam Moghadam alone to defend herself against rape. But
the authorities, not only decided to detain Afsaneh Norouzi for
intentionally murdering Behzad Aghdam Moghadam, a charge that entails
mandatory pre-trial detention, but also to detain Mostafa Jahangiri. Since
Kish did not have a prison, the couple was transferred to the nearest
township, Bandar Abbas, capital city of the Hormozgan province, so that
the Kish General Court, and its judge Iraj Khazai, could investigate,
prosecute and try the case as provided by the then criminal laws.
However, once in Bandar Abbas, the Chief Police Detective arbitrarily held
the couple in incommunicado detention to conduct his own interrogations.
For six months, he and his subordinates repeatedly interrogated the
couple; each time beating and threatening them to force them to confess
falsely, initially that Mostafa Jahangiri had killed Behzad Aghdam
Moghadam because he owed money and then that Afsaneh Norouzi had killed
him because of the above reason and because she had an illicit sexual
affair with him.
As a result of the prolonged physical and psychological tortures, they
both suffered physically and mentally. Afsaneh Norouzi repeatedly
attempted suicide: once by trying to hang herself with a rubber hose in
the toilet and several times by cutting her wrist. She also made several
false confessions.
Later on, when the couple was transferred from police custody to prison,
Afsaneh Norouzi retracted all of her false confessions. She even named her
torturers before Judge Khazai. Her complaint was disregarded. Eventually,
however, after two years, Judge Khazai accepted her account of events and
the opinions of the five police and forensic experts who supported her
account. He even recommended that the couple be released on bail until
trial.
Another year passed without the trial commencing. In the three years that
Afsaneh Norouzi and her husband had so far lingered in pre-trial
detention, they could not see their children at all. The first eight
months, they could not see each other either and thereafter they could
only visit each other in prison every three weeks. Officials disregarded
their complaints. Hitting rock bottom, Mostafa Jahangiri sewed his lips
shut in protest and went on a hunger strike for 16 days. Afsaneh Norouzi
broke down too when she heard about her husband's dire situation. After
taking her 140 inmates hostage and making threats with a broken bottle,
she was hospitalized.
A few months later, Judge Khazai was suddenly taken off the case and,
finally, on 19 October 2000, a new judge named Mortazawi tried Afsaneh
Norouzi and Mostafa Jahangiri. Mostafa Jahangiri was acquitted and
released from prison, but Afsaneh Norouzi was convicted of intentionally
and premeditatedly murdering Behzad Aghdam Moghadam and condemned to the
mandatory death penalty (qisas-e-nafs).
The trial was held in secret. The court appointed lawyer was treated as if
he was not even there. Experts were not called to testify and forensic
evidence was not discussed. The judge continuously responded to Afsaneh
Norouzi's remarks with verbally abusive language and merely used the
opportunity to declare his already formed opinions.
The final judgment, issued four working days later, was riddled with
flagrant legal and factual errors, mischaracterizations, omissions, and
anti-women prejudices. It rested on the fictitious scenario that Bandar
Abbas police detectives had previously obtained from Afsaneh Norouzi under
torture. Although Afsaneh Norouzi had retracted those false confessions
both before Judge Khazai and before Mortazawi and had even lodged a formal
complaint about it at trial, these confessions became, in part, the bases
of the conviction.
More incredibly, Mortazawi also relied on some unbelievably sophisticated
remarks, for example concerning "promissory notes", attributed to the
nine-year-old Mahdieh, despite evidence that the police had extracted them
by intimidation and inducements such as "these remarks will help your
mother". Most significantly, the judge summarily rejected the multitude of
solid medico-legal evidence, including scene examination and event
reconstruction, forensic reports, and expert opinion that were produced by
five police detectives and forensic doctors early on and supported Afsaneh
Norouzi's account of events.
Despite the judicial errors, Branch 16 of the Supreme Court summarily
rejected Afsaneh Norouzi's appeal on 16 February 2002. Facing this
arbitrary rejection and her imminent execution, Afsaneh Norouzi's husband
and new pro-bono lawyer, Abdolsamad Khoramshahi, took her case to the
press. With their initiative and the efforts of many reporters,
journalists and activists inside Iran, all of whom risking harassment and
illegitimate prosecution for exposing state injustices, Afsaneh Norouzi's
case received an unprecedented publicity nationally and internationally
for the next 2 years.
Unresponsive to public outcry, the State General Prosecutor also summarily
rejected a subsequent annulment request lodged by Abdolsamad Khoramshahi.
By September 2002, Afsaneh Norouzi's file was sent back to Kish Court for
the carrying out of the qisas-e-nafs sentence, pending authentication of
the victim's living heirs and documentation of their request for her
qisas-e-nafs. Under Islamic Penal Code of Iran, in a qisas-e-nafs death
sentence, the decision to actually inflict the death rests with the
victim's heirs. The heirs can also forgo their right to qisas and instead
request diyeh (blood-money) or just pardon the culprit. Thus, the state
itself can neither commute the sentence nor grant clemency to the person
sentenced to qisas-e-nafs.
On 28 September 2003, prison officials instructed Afsaneh Norouzi to sign
her death warrant. Iran's law requires only a 48-hour minimum notification
of a death warrant before actual execution.
Following an even wider and stronger public outcry nationally and
internationally, Ayatollah Hashemi Shahrudi, the Head of the Judiciary
ordered suspension of Afsaneh Norouzi's death sentence. Four months later,
in February 2004, Afsaneh Norouzi's case was submitted to Branch 26
Supreme Court in Qom for a review. After a further 6 months, it was
announced on 26 July 2004 that "due to some errors of law", Branch 26 has
quashed the verdict and the case was referred back to the Kish General
Court for retrial.
Afsaneh Norouzi finally received a new trial on 21 December 2004, almost
as flawed as her 1st trial. Not only was the hearing once again held
behind closed doors (according to one daily paper even her husband was not
allowed in the court room), but it was also closely supervised by the Head
of the Hormozgan Justice Administration as well a representative from the
Head of the Judiciary. Ali Asghar Abbasi, the trial judge who was
appointed to Kish Court just 2 months previously, had no previous trial
experience.
Worse still, as Afsaneh Norouzi and the public eagerly awaited an
acquittal; judicial officials unlawfully circumvented the trial process.
Compared to years of dawdling over bringing Afsaneh Norouzi even one step
closer to freedom, this time officials "worked tirelessly around the clock
for days" to press Behzad Aghdam Moghadam's family (his mother and 2
children) to forgo Afsaneh Norouzi's qisas-e-nafs death penalty, a
sentence that had supposedly been quashed by Branch 26 of the Supreme
Court.
Offering the family an exorbitant 50 million Tuman in "blood money"
(diyeh) (a normal diyeh in Iran is 22 million Tuman); officials announced
on 11 January 2005 that they had obtained their consent. Consequently,
Afsaneh Norouzi, like any other murder convict graciously pardoned by the
victim's family, became liable for paying the agreed diyeh. As the public
once again took action to support Afsaneh Norouzi by making contributions
for the payment of the diyeh, judicial officials announced on 26 January
2005 that the state has re-negotiated and paid a lower amount of diyeh (31
million Tumans) to Moghadam's family.
A day later, Afsaneh Norouzi was finally released after spending 2760 days
in detention. There is, of course, no remedy that can erase the harm done
to any wrongfully convicted and imprisoned person. But justice demands
that the unjustly convicted at least receive an acknowledgment of the
wrong done and of their innocence, as well as compensation.
Afsaneh Norouzi's pardon not only denied her any justice, but once again
profiled her as an intentional murderer. Facing public criticism and to
justify their unlawful intervention, Iranian judiciary officials restated
that "Afsaneh Norouzi's act has not been in self-defense and the claims of
her defense attorney have not been proven." Afsaneh Norouzi, they
professed, was solely "indebted" to the "generosity" of their "Islamic
system" and "those who claim violation of her civil rights are
rumor-mongers intending to taint the system".
In the court of public opinion, however, Afsaneh Norouzi's pardon, like
her infamous death sentence, epitomize the disastrous state of the Iranian
Islamic justice system, a system riddled with laws that blatantly flout
human rights, procedures and practices that contradict standards for fair
trial, political influences and discrimination against women.
This article was written by an outside contributor and does not
necessarily reflect Amnesty International policy.
Author's note:
All the events described in this article are extracted from reports
published in the Iranian press and by individual journalists between March
2002 and March 2005. These include daily papers: Etemaad, Hayat-e-no,
Iran, Shargh, Vaghyeh-e-Etefaghieh, and Yase-e-no newspapers; the news
agencies FARS, ILNA and ISNA, Zannan Magazine and articles by Asieh Amini,
Payam Fazlinejad, Sina Ghanbarpour, Fereshteh Ghazi, Shahram Rafizadeh,
Shadi Sadr, and Mitra Shojayi.
(source: Amnesty International)
ENGLAND/SAUDI ARABIA:
London Protest Against Saudi Torture and Executions of Gays----Defend Gay
Muslims Persecuted by Fundamentalism, Says OutRage!
Gay and human rights activists are to protest outside the Saudi Arabian
Embassy in London next week as part of the International Day Against
Homophobia (IDAHO). Simultaneous protests will take place in 50 cities
across the globe.
Saudi Arabia has been declared "the world's most homophobic country"
following recent mass arrests, torture and flogging of gay Muslims: 35 of
the 105 men arrested in March after allegedly attending a "gay wedding"
have been sentenced to floggings, some up to 2000 lashes which is often
fatal.
They, and the other 70 arrested men, have been sentenced to 1 year in
jail, where they are likely to suffer torture and rape.
Saudi Arabias unelected leaders enforce a fundamentalist version of Islam.
They impose the death penalty for homosexuality. Several gay Muslims have
been beheaded in recent years.
In spite of these atrocities unleashed on gay Saudis, and the wider human
rights abuses perpetrated by the Saudi dictatorship (including the denial
of rights to women and religious minorities), the countrys fundamentalist
rulers enjoy friendly relations with the UK and the US. Tony Blair and
George Bush sell weapons to Saudi Arabia.
"It is time the Saudis were named and shamed," insisted Brett Lock of
OutRage! "It is hoped Tuesdays protest will help draw public attention to
the abuse of gay human rights in the Saudi kingdom, and prompt
international sanctions by the EU and the UN," said Brett Lock of OutRage!
Derek Lennard, chair of the Gay & Lesbian Humanist Association (GAHLA) is
co-ordinating the UKs participation in IDAHO. He is urging all LGBT and
human rights groups to turn out on May 17 to "register our protest against
the brutal maltreatment the Saudi Arabian regime metes out to its LGBT
citizens."
The IDAHO protest at the Saudi Embassy is supported by OutRage! and the
Gay & Lesbian Humanist Association. Both organizations are urging a wide
cross section of LGBT individuals and organisations to join the protest on
Tuesday.
Amnesty International is also appealing for intervention against the
Saudis.
- The protest on Tuesday May 17 is being held between 12 noon and 2pm
outside the Saudi Arabian Embassy which is at 30 Charles Street, London
W1J 5DZ (nearest tube Green Park).
(source: UK Gay News)
TURKEY:
Ocalan Verdict Puts Turkey Under Pressure
Europe's top human rights court declared the 1999 trial of Kurdish rebel
Abdullah Ocalan unfair on Thursday, pressuring Turkey to defy nationalist
anger and order a retrial in support of its EU ambitions.
Ankara signaled Ocalan could indeed be tried anew. But it moved quickly to
assure Turks who revile him as a terrorist bent on dismembering their
nation that he would not walk free.
"Whether this dossier is reopened or not, the matter (of Ocalan's guilt)
is a closed one for the nation's conscience," Prime Minister Tayyip
Erdogan said during a trip to Hungary.
The verdict from the European Court of Human Rightsraised fears of revived
political tensions in Turkey at a delicate time as it tries to meet
European Union standards on human rights before the start of EU entry
talks in October.
Ocalan, serving a life term for treason as sole inmate of an island prison
near Istanbul, evokes strong emotions among Turks who blame him for the
deaths of some 30,000 people in the 1980s and 1990s. He was sentenced to
death in 1999 but capital punishment was revoked in 2002 as part of
EU-inspired reforms.
The powerful military, facing a recent increase in clashes with Ocalan
followers, condemned the ECHR ruling as "political, not legal" -- echoing
a widespread nationalist sentiment here that Europe is deliberately
engineering problems for Turkey.
As word of the Strasbourg court verdict came, television aired dramatic
1999 footage of mustachioed Ocalan blindfolded on a plane after his
capture in Kenya by Turkish commandos -- a scene which triggered euphoria
and pride in Turkey at the time.
Hoping to avert nationalist anger over the new legal twist, Justice
Minister Cemil Cicek said: "We must be as cold-blooded as possible... This
is not the end of the world... Our people must not be concerned (about the
possible outcome of a retrial), they must trust the state and the
judiciary."
LONG PROCESS
The ECHR verdict must still be approved by the Council of Europe, the
continent's top human rights watchdog.
"This is a long process and we still have a great deal of time," Foreign
Minister Abdullah Gul said during a trip to Kiev.
A panel of ECHR judges, reaching their verdict by 11 to 6, said in a
statement that Ocalan had not had proper access to legal counsel or the
facilities needed for his defense.
"The applicant was not tried by an independent and impartial tribunal,"
they said. Ocalan was tried by a State Security Court -- a body set up to
deal with crimes against the state which has now been disbanded in line
with EU-inspired reforms.
Dozens of Kurds cheered and chanted outside the ECHR under a banner
declaring "Free Ocalan - Peace in Kurdistan."
In Turkey too, Kurdish reaction was favorable.
"I hope (this decision) will contribute to Turkey's democratisation," said
Osman Baydemir, mayor of Diyarbakir, the biggest city in Turkey's mainly
Kurdish southeast region.
The European Commission, which will lead Turkey's EU entry talks, welcomed
the government's calm response to the verdict but also underlined Ankara's
legal obligations.
"The European Court of Human Rights is a core European institution and a
fundamental implementor of human rights and the rule of law. It is evident
Turkey will have to comply," said EU Enlargement Commissioner Ollie Rehn
during a trip to Cyprus.
A Commission spokesman in Brussels, asked whether the verdict might affect
Turkey's accession talks, said the EU would wait to see how Ankara
implemented the ruling in practice.
MILITARY IRKED
Financial markets shrugged off the verdict, suggesting that the
government's reaction had struck the right balance in placating
nationalists and Brussels officials. The center-right government must show
continued skill to stop the issue hampering EU entry talks and the foreign
investment that could follow.
But the Turkish military made clear its displeasure.
"Nobody can expect an institution which gave thousands of martyrs (in the
fight against separatism) to stay impartial," said General Ilker Basbug,
deputy head of the General Staff.
Liberal political analyst Dogu Ergil of Ankara University said he expected
both Kurdish radicals and Turkish nationalists to try to exploit the ECHR
verdict for their own ends.
"The feeling in Turkey of being under siege by hostile international
forces will increase a little bit more," he said.
(source: Reuters)
KUWAIT:
DEATH PENALTY SOUGHT FOR MILITANTS
Public prosecutors in Kuwait have requested the death penalty for 20 of
the 35 militants, believed to be linked to al-Qaeda, who clashed with
police in January this year. In a 2,000 page indictment, which followed a
three and a half month-long inquiry, prosecutors sought jail terms for the
other 15 militants. The trial is set to begin on May 24.
The militants are all thought to be members of a group called the
'Peninsula Lions', which is reported to be linked to al-Qaeda and the
Saudi al-Haramain Brigades. Most of them are accused of fighting the
security forces in 4 gun battles over the space of 3 weeks in the
tiny-oil-rich state. The clashes left 4 policemen and 8 militants dead, as
well as 2 civilians - 1 Kuwaiti and 1 Bahraini.
The man considered the ringleader, Amer Khalaif al-Enezi, died in police
custody eight days after he was arrested on January 31. The Kuwaiti
authorities say tests showed al-Enezi - who was in his 30s - died of heart
failure.
Al-Enezi's wife is one of the defendents, along with the cleric Shiekh
Hamed Al-Ali, who is charged with issuing fatwas. Most of those set to be
tried are Kuwaiti, but the group also includes Saudis, stateless Arabs
known as bidoons and one Jordanian.
Earlier this week a criminal court in Kuwait sentenced 1 militant to 8
years in prison and jailed 19 others for 3 years for plotting to fight
against US-led forces in Iraq.
(source: AKI)
