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IRAN: KURDISH PRISONERS REVOLT
OVER INMATE HANGINGS
Tehran, 30 Dec.
(AKI) - Amid rising tension in Iranian Kurdistan, prisoners in Urumieh
prison in western Iran are rioting over the imminent hanging of one of
their fellow detainees - a Kurd named Massoud Shokkehi - and the
hanging in recent days of another Kurd being held in Sagghez prison,
also in Iranian Kurdistan. A total 51 Kurdish militants have been
summoned to appear before the Revolutionary court in Sanandaj, accused
of sedition. They face the death penalty if convicted.
On Thursday, violent protests broke out when police officers came to
take Shokkehi away for execution, together with another Kurdish
prisoner, Salah Mohammadi Guylani, being held in another prison.
Shokkehi had been in Urumieh for nine years.
A young Iranian Kurd was hanged in Sagghez on Wednesday. Farhad
Salehpour, 19, was arrested some 12 months ago and sentenced to death
for killing a Islamist militiaman. A member of a separatist Kurdish
group, Salepour spent eleven months in Sagghez on death row before
being executed. Also on Wednesday, four more Kurds who allegedly took
part in unrest earlier this year were re-arrested. They had been
released conditionally earlier this month.
There have been violent protests in many cities in Iranian Kurdistan
in recent months, and the situation remains tense.
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