Death Commission Judge Ebrahim Raisi nominated for Iran presidential election

Iran’s judiciary chief, Death Commission Judge Ebrahim Raisi declared his candidacy on Saturday for next month’s presidential election.

“I have come as an independent to the stage to make changes in the executive management of the country and to fight poverty, corruption, humiliation and discrimination,” Raisi was quoted as saying in a statement by local media.

Appointed by the regime’s Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei as the head of the Judiciary in March 2019, Raisi has emerged as one of Iran’s most powerful figures and a contender to succeed Khamenei.

He lost to Hassan Rouhani in the 2017 presidential election.

The vote takes place amid systematic violations of human rights in Iran in all its forms.

During the 1988 massacre of 30,000 political prisoners, Raisi was a member of the “Death Commission,” a group of so-called judges who sentenced the prisoners to death in minutes-long trials.

Health fears for jailed activist Saba Kord Afshari on hunger strike

Jailed women’s rights activist, Saba Kord Afshari went on hunger strike since May 8, to protest the regime’s increasing pressure on the families of political prisoners, including her mother, Raheleh Ahmadi, who is also in prison.

She demands that her mother be released from Evin Prison.

The imprisoned civil activist called her family members on Saturday to announce that she had started a hunger strike and informed prison officials of her decision.

Saba Kord Afshari has several times suffered stomach ulcer bleeding. So, her hunger strike has caused serious concern for her family. With the start of hunger strike, the civil activist is suffering from severe stomach pain.

Revolutionary court sentences Baha’i woman to eight years in prison

A revolutionary court in Iran has sentenced a Baha’i woman to eight years in prison on the charge of forming a group to empower women.

According to the verdict issued by Branch 26 of the Revolutionary Court of Tehran, presided over by Judge Afshari, Atsa Ahmadai Rafsanjani has been sentenced to four years for ““formation of a group to act against national security through requesting an NGO license from the Interior Ministry”, 3 years in prison for “assembly and collusion to act against national security”, and to one year in prison on the charge of “propaganda against the state.”

152 Former U.N. and Human Rights Experts Call for Commission to Investigate 1988 Massacre of Iranian Political Prisoners

(CNS News) -- On May 3, more than 150 former U.N. officials, human rights activists, and legal experts sent an open letter to the U.N. High Commissioner for Human Rights requesting that a "Commission of Inquiry into the 1988 mass extrajudicial executions and forced disappearances" in Iran be established.

The letter notes that the 1988 killings of thousands of political prisoners across Iran, mostly of supporters of the People's Mujahedin of Iran, may have constituted "crimes against humanity."