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The fighter Navid Afkari was executed in Iran. The 27-year-old was executed at the Adel-Abad prison in the southern Iranian city of Shiraz, the head of the judiciary in Fars province, Kasem Mousavi, told state television.
According to the Iranian judiciary, Afkari killed a security officer during a demonstration in Shiraz in 2018 against the country’s economic and political situation. It was said that he had confessed. The confession and recordings of the alleged crime were shown on Iranian state television and on the “Aparat” video portal. The ruling was upheld by the highest court in the country.
The athlete, his family and human rights organizations alleged that the confession was obtained through torture. His brothers Vahid and Habib had been sentenced to 54 and 27 years in prison and 74 lashes each.
Navid Afkari’s attorney, Hassan Younessi, said there was no evidence of his guilt. He announced that a meeting was scheduled for Sunday between the victim’s relatives and people from Shiraz who wanted to apologize. One still hopes the news is wrong. Furthermore, the law also grants the convicted person the right to see her family before being executed. Mousavi said the execution was carried out in the presence of the family of the victims.
The Iranian judiciary rejected the allegations of torture, as well as criticism of the ruling. Afkari had murdered a person and the sentence against him was not the death penalty, but “Ghissas”, it said. “Ghissas” is the principle of retaliation, blood revenge or an eye for an eye in Islamic law.
Around the world, athletes, politicians, associations and organizations had previously expressed their horror at the death sentence and demanded that Afkari be given a fair trial. This was channeled through the “Save Navid Afkari” campaign. Johannes Herber, Managing Director of Athleten Deutschland, had called on “all athletes” to “show solidarity with Navid Afkari: if an athlete’s peaceful protest is met with torture and execution, we must not keep silent.”
Maximilian Klein, responsible for international sports policy at Athleten Deutschland, also appealed to “IOC, sports associations such as United World Wrestling (UWW) or Fifa, as well as sponsors, to use their influence to save Navid from death “. A country that tramples human rights in this way “cannot be part of the global sports community that is committed to defending human dignity.”
