Swedish court upholds life sentence in Iran executions case

On Tuesday, a Swedish appeals court affirmed the life term and guilty conviction handed to a former Iranian official who was found guilty last year of participating in the 1988 mass execution of political prisoners in Iran.

Iran fiercely objected to the Stockholm District Court’s 2022 judgment, claiming it was politically motivated, finding Hamid Noury guilty of murder and significant offenses under international law.

Several hundred demonstrators who had assembled outside the court, waving flags and chanting chants demanding the overthrow of the Iranian regime, cheered the Appeal Court’s ruling.

Abdolreza Shafie, a member of the Foreign Affairs Committee of the National Council of Resistance of Iran, an umbrella organization for the opposition, told Reuters, “It’s a great day, it’s a beautiful day and justice has prevailed.”

Noury is the only individual to have been tried for the 1988 massacres at the Gohardasht jail in Karaj, Iran, which killed political dissidents and members of the Iranian People’s Mujahideen. This group was fighting throughout the country.

According to Amnesty International’s 2018 report, “the real number could be higher” regarding the number of people executed on government orders, which pegged at about 5,000. Iran has never confirmed the deaths.

Courts in Sweden have the authority to try foreign nationals, including citizens of Sweden, for offenses against international law.

In 2019, Noury was detained at a Stockholm airport after he refuted the allegations.

Sweden and Iran are now deeply divided as a result of the case.

An Iranian court began the trial of a Swedish employee of the European Union who was detained in 2022 while on vacation there earlier this month.

Johan Floderus faces charges of espionage on behalf of Israel and “corruption on earth,” which is a capital offense.

Sweden, which views the imprisonment as arbitrary, has asked for his immediate release.

Human rights organizations and governments in the West have accused the Islamic Republic of attempting to use fabricated security allegations to get political concessions out of other nations.

Tehran claims that these arrests follow criminal legislation and do not keep anyone for political purposes.