They burned the Koran and insulted the Prophet Mohammed: for this reason two men, Sadrollah Fazeli Zarei and Youssef Mehrdad, were sentenced to death in Iran, which was carried out today by hanging. This was announced by the online site of the Iranian judiciary Mizan. In March 2021, one of the accused admitted to having posted insults to Islam on his social media accounts.
For both, the formal accusation was of “Sabulnabi” (“insult to the prophet”) for having published messages deemed insulting against religion, the Prophet Mohammed, Mohammed’s mother and the Shiite imams. Mehrdad had founded and led 15 groups that promoted “sacrilege and blasphemy” on social media.
The two acted using an Iranian telephone number and a French number. Some Shiite preachers in Iran had issued a fatwa against them. Hangings for blasphemy are rare in the country: 582 people were executed in 2022, compared to 333 in 2021, according to data reported by Iran Human Rights.
