Iran's Supreme Court upholds death sentence of another protester

Saman Mohammadi Khiyareh, a Kurdish political prisoner from Sanandaj in western Iran, was executed after more than 15 years in detention, the Mizan news agency reported. Hours earlier, the Hengaw human rights group said he had been transferred from Ghezel Hesar Prison in Karaj, near Tehran, to solitary confinement for execution.

Mohammadi Khiyareh was first arrested in February 2010 and sentenced to death by Tehran’s Revolutionary Court on charges of moharebeh—“enmity against God.” The Supreme Court initially overturned the ruling, replacing it with a 15-year prison term for alleged membership in opposition groups. However, following pressure from security agencies, the court reinstated the death sentence after a retrial.

Six ethnic Arab prisoners executed in southern Iran

Mizan also reported the execution of six people in Khuzestan Province on security-related charges but withheld their names, a move that rights groups said makes the cases “secret executions.” The men had been convicted of “killing police officers, communicating with Israel, separatism, bombings, and armed attacks,” the judiciary said.

Without presenting evidence, the judiciary accused them of involvement in attacks on a gas station in Khorramshahr, bank assaults, grenade attacks on a military center, and shootings at mosques.

The Karun Human Rights Organization later identified the executed prisoners as Ali Majdam, Moein Khanfari, Salem Mousavi, Mohammadreza Moghaddam, Adnan Alboshokeh (Ghobeishavi), and Habib Dris.

According to Karun, the men were arrested between late 2018 and early 2019 and later sentenced to death by the Ahvaz Revolutionary Court for alleged membership in opposition groups.

The defendants’ confessions appeared to have been obtained under unclear circumstances, Hengaw and the Human Rights Activists News Agency (HRANA) both reported.
These six Arab political prisoners were accused of killing two Basij members in Abadan, a police officer, and a conscript soldier in Bandar Imam Khomeini.

Amnesty International had earlier warned of imminent executions, noting that the defendants were denied legal representation during the hearings.

Surge in executions

Rights groups reported a sharp rise in executions across Iran in September 2025. Hengaw said it documented at least 187 executions during the month, while Iran Human Rights put the figure at 171, the highest monthly count in two decades.

Only 10 of those executions—less than six percent—were officially announced, Iran Human Rights said. Most were related to drug or murder charges, while three were for moharebeh or espionage.

The group warned that the surge marks an unprecedented pace of executions in the past 30 years, recording more than 1,040 executions in the first nine months of 2025—double the number during the same period last year.

Masoud Peyma, who has represented Qaneifard since 2017, said his client was arrested on March 28 after reporting to the Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) office in Dallas to register a new address. Qaneifard had recently moved from California after accepting a teaching offer at a Dallas college, he said.

Instead of processing the address change, ICE detained him and sent him to a facility for undocumented migrants, according to Peyma.

Qaneifard is being held at the Prairieland Detention Center in Alvarado, Texas, which houses more than 700 people and has faced complaints of overcrowding and harsh conditions, US media have reported.

Between 2003 and 2012, he spent long periods in the United States on a student visa or making visits to the country, his lawyer added.

Previous arrest and failed deportation attempt

Peyma said Qaneifard first sought asylum in 2013 but left the United States before the case was resolved. He re-entered in 2017 via the Mexico border, applied for asylum, and was detained at an ICE facility in El Paso until July 2020.

During that detention, the US attempted to deport him through Azerbaijan in 2019, but Qaneifard refused to board a Tehran-bound plane, according to Peyma.

After his release, he lived in Washington and later in California under an “Order of Supervision,” which allowed him to remain in the country but required regular check-ins with ICE.

Peyma said Qaneifard has never married, has no record with the FBI, and has never been employed by US government agencies. He has supported himself in recent years through teaching, writing and giving interviews.

Risk of forced return

Peyma said ICE contacted Iran’s Interests Section in Washington six months ago, asking for travel papers to deport Qaneifard, but Tehran has yet to respond.

“The risk is real. If he is sent back, his life will be in danger,” Peyma said. “There is no reason for him to remain in detention after six months.”

The lawyer said Qaneifard’s case is being pursued on two tracks. “I have filed a petition in federal court in Texas for his release, given that more than six months have passed since his detention,” he said. “At the same time, a second lawyer has filed an appeal in the immigration court in Virginia with new documents to support his asylum claim.”

Peyma said Qaneifard’s earlier asylum request was rejected in 2018 for lack of evidence. “We hope the new materials on his recent political activities convince the appeals court that deportation would put his life at serious risk,” he said.

Other Iranians deported

The case comes after the United States deported a group of Iranians to Tehran in a chartered operation coordinated with Iranian authorities, the New York Times reported.

The paper said a US-chartered flight took off from a military airport in Louisiana, stopped in Puerto Rico to pick up more deportees, and then continued to Doha, Qatar, before passengers were transferred to another chartered plane to Tehran.

Iranian officials told the Times that ICE had initially said 120 people would be on the flight, but later notified them only 55 were on board, with the rest to follow. Many of those deported had spent months in US detention facilities with asylum claims rejected and accepted return because the alternative was deportation to third countries such as Sudan or Somalia, the Times said.

Immigration attorney Ali Herischi told Iran International that some deportees were political dissidents or Christian converts. He said they were shackled on flights, separated from their families, and their belongings and documents were handed to Iranian authorities. “That is very dangerous,” he said.

The New York Times reported the deportations followed months of talks between Washington and Tehran. US officials have not publicly confirmed the details.

The deportations were part of a larger operation that returned 120 Iranians from US custody to Tehran.

Ali Herischi, an immigration attorney at Maryland-based Herischi & Associates, told Iran International that one of his clients is a political dissident and the other a Christian convert.

Both had crossed into the United States from the border with Mexico to claim asylum. The dissident’s wife, who recently gave birth in the United States, is now caring for their three-month-old child alone.

“She is devastated,” Herischi said. “There’s significant uncertainty about the future and when they can reunite.”

Herischi said neither client consented to deportation, warning that their files, phones and documents were handed to Iranian authorities.

“Unfortunately, their belongings — including their files, evidence and cell phones — have been handed to Iranian authorities. That’s very dangerous.”

The State Department and the Department of Homeland Security did not immediately respond an Iran International request for comment.

On Tuesday, the New York Times reported that a US-chartered flight carrying over 100 Iranians left a military airport in Louisiana, stopped in Puerto Rico to pick up additional deportees, and then continued to Doha, Qatar, before the passengers were transferred onto another chartered flight to Tehran.

Herischi estimates as many as 220 people were deported, though some were left in Qatar. The deportees, he added, were denied the chance to fully argue their asylum cases per rules during the Trump presidency that restricts claims by those who entered through the southern border.

‘Pick your poison'

Earlier this year, the United States deported another group of Iranians — many of them Christian converts — to Costa Rica and Panama, despite the risk of persecution they could face back home.

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  Deported by US, Iranian Christian convert stranded in Panama jungle camp

According to Herischi, deportees were sometimes presented with a choice: “ICE would say, 'either you consent to deportation to Iran, or we send you to Somalia or Sudan.' It was, 'pick your poison.' In the case of my clients, they didn’t even get that. They just said, you’re done, let’s go.”

The deportation flight, The New York Times reported, followed “months of negotiations” between Washington and Tehran, citing two senior Iranian officials involved in the talks and a US official with knowledge of the plans.

According to the Times, the State Department first approached Iran’s interests section in Washington about coordinating deportations three months ago. Iran had to verify identities and issue travel documents for some detainees.

Herischi said, “We need to know what has been exchanged in price of deportation of those individuals... Whether Iran had any influence on the list of deportees or set the priority of who is going to accept.”

The move, Herischi added, risks normalizing Iran’s human rights record and undermining America’s stated commitment to protecting persecuted minorities. “It’s like, oh, it’s just a normal country, why do we care? That’s not right.”

An Islamic Revolutionary Court had originally sentenced Morteza (Calvin) Faghanpour Sassi, Abolfazl (Benjamin) Ahmadzadeh Khajani, Hossam al-Din (Yahya) Mohammad Joneydi, and two others whose names were not disclosed.

The defendants have chosen Christian names for themselves.

Each was given seven years and six months for “deviant educational and propaganda activities contrary to and disruptive of Islamic Sharia, involving foreign connections,” plus an additional seven months for “propaganda against the system,” according to the Christian outlet Mohabbat News.

Faghanpour Sassi received an extra 17 months for “insulting the leadership.”

The court cited reports from the Intelligence Ministry, defendants’ statements and evidence of house churches, Christian promotion, enrollment in foreign online universities, training trips to Turkey and efforts to recruit others as grounds for upholding the convictions.

The defendants were pressured to sign statements renouncing their faith in exchange for reduced sentences, while “at least one of them, Morteza Faghanpour Sassi was subjected to physical torture,” according to the advocacy group Article 18.

Iran has shut down Persian-language churches and frequently raids homes and house-churches. Converts often face accusations such as promoting “Zionist Christianity,” membership in groups opposed to the Islamic Republic or attempting to convert Muslims - charges that can lead to lengthy imprisonment often without substantial evidence.

Under Iranian law, only ethnic Armenians and Assyrians born into Christianity are recognized as Christians. Conversion from Islam is prohibited.

Renaz Ebrahimi, 34, holds Finnish citizenship - one of the many nationalities represented on board the so-called Global Sumud Flotilla, which includes participants from various countries including Spain, Italy, Turkey and Malaysia.

In a video transmitted on Instagram, she appears to narrate the moment of her detention by Israeli forces while labeling its incursion into Gaza a genocide.

Israel denies the charge and has accused the activists of performing propaganda for Hamas militants.

She was aboard the Polish-flagged Marinette with six crew members, which was stopped 49 miles from Gaza's coastline.

On social media, Ebrahimi identifies herself as a journalist and activist, with a series of videos in Finnish about the recent flotilla movement to Gaza.

The Israeli navy stopped the flotilla, detained those on board on charges of attempting to cross a blockade, and is currently in the process of deporting them.

The flotilla launched in July 2025 as a humanitarian aid mission to break Israel's blockade of the coastal enclave. It started with 44 vessels, all of which have now been stopped by Israeli forces.

The Freedom Flotilla Coalition, which has organized several such missions since 2008, released a statement upon the interception by the Israeli navy, vowing to continue their efforts.

“We stand with every human rights defender aboard. Their courage is part of our shared struggle to end Israel’s deadly siege,” the statement said.

Greta Thunberg, the Swedish climate activist, was also among those detained.

Israel imposed a land, air and sea blockade on the Gaza Strip in 2007 after Hamas took control of the territory. The aim was to prevent weapons smuggling and restrict Hamas’s military capabilities.