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Human Rights Commissioner Strässer on the imminent execution of Salar Shadizadi in Iran
Following new reports on the imminent execution of the young Iranian Salar Shadizadi, the Federal Government Commissioner for Human Rights Policy and Humanitarian Aid at the Federal Foreign Office, Christoph Strässer, issued the following statement today (27 November):
I am shocked by the news that Salar Shadizadi, who was 15 years old at the time of the crime, is to be executed tomorrow! His execution was cancelled at the last second in August, but his case has not been retried.
I call on the authorities in Iran to halt the execution immediately, to overturn the death sentence and to finally grant Salar Shadizadi a fair retrial!
I am gravely concerned to see that Iran is increasingly carrying out death sentences and does not even stop at executing minors. This is a clear violation of the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child, which Iran has ratified.
Background:
Salar Shadizadi was arrested in February 2007 and sentenced to death in December 2007 for the murder of a friend, who was allegedly found stabbed to death in the Shadizadi family’s garden. His execution has already been halted twice (in July 2013 and August 2015), but his death sentence has been upheld. Two people who were minors at the time of the crime for which they were tried were executed in Iran only a few weeks ago.