DUBAI
\nIran said Monday it executed a second prisoner detained and convicted amid nationwide protests challenging the country\u2019s theocracy, airing footage on state television it claimed shows him stabbing two security force members to death and running away.
\nThe public hanging of Majidreza Rahnavard, less than a month after he allegedly carried out the fatal stabbings \u2014 purportedly angry about security forces killing protesters \u2014 shows the speed at which Iran now carries out death sentences handed down for those detained in the demonstrations the government hopes to put down.
\nActivists warn that at least a dozen people already have been sentenced to death in closed-door hearings. At least 488 people have been killed since the demonstrations began in mid-September, according to Human Rights Activists in Iran, a group that\u2019s been monitoring the protests. Another 18,200 people have been detained by authorities.
\nIran\u2019s Mizan news agency, under the country\u2019s judiciary, alleged Rahnavard had stabbed two security force members to death Nov. 17 in Mashhad and wounded four others.
\nFootage aired on state TV showed a man chasing another around a street corner, then standing over him and stabbing him after he fell against a parked motorbike. Another showed the same man stabbing another immediately after. The assailant, which state TV alleged was Rahnavard, then fled.
\nThe Mizan report identified the dead as \u201cstudent\u201d Basij, paramilitary volunteers under Iran\u2019s Revolutionary Guard. The Basij (ba-SEEJ\u2019) have deployed in major cities, attacking and detaining protesters, who in many cases have fought back.
\nA heavily edited state television report aired after Rahnavard\u2019s execution showed clips of him in the courtroom. In the video, he says he came to hate the Basijis after seeing video clips on social media of the forces beating and killing protesters.
\nThe Mizan report accused Rahnavard of trying to flee to a foreign country when he was arrested.
\nMashhad, a Shiite holy city, is located some 740 kilometers (460 miles) east of the Iranian capital, Tehran. Activists say it has seen strikes, shops closed and demonstrations amid the unrest that began over the Sept. 16 death in custody of Mahsa Amini, a 22-year-old woman who had been detained by Iran\u2019s morality police.
\nMizan said Rahnavard was convicted in Mashhad\u2019s Revolutionary Court. The tribunals have been internationally criticized for not allowing those on trial to pick their own lawyers or even see the evidence against them.
\nRahnavard had been convicted on the charge of \u201cmoharebeh,\u201d a Farsi word meaning \u201cwaging war against God.\u201d That charge has been levied against others in the decades since the 1979 Islamic Revolution and carries the death penalty.
\nIran is one of the world\u2019s top executioners and typically executes prisoners by hanging. It executed the first prisoner detained during demonstrations last Thursday.
\nAmnesty International has said it obtained a document signed by one senior Iranian police commander asking that the execution for one prisoner be \u201ccompleted \u2018in the shortest possible time\u2019 and that his death sentence be carried out in public as \u2018a heart-warming gesture toward the security forces.\u2019\u201d
\nAmid the unrest, Iran is also battered by an economic crisis that has seen the national currency, the rial, drop to new lows against the US dollar.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
DUBAI Iran said Monday it executed a second prisoner detained and convicted amid nationwide protests challenging the country\u2019s theocracy, airing footage on state television it claimed shows him stabbing two security force members to death and running away. The public hanging of Majidreza Rahnavard, less than a month after he allegedly carried out the fatal […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":300867,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-300840","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-world"},"yoast_head":"\n