Majidreza Rahnavard: Iran publicly executes man it accused of stabbing security forces amid protests

Iran has executed a second prisoner who had been detained and swiftly convicted amid widespread protests challenging the country's strict regime.

Footage aired on state television claimed to show a man stabbing two security force members to death and running away.

The regime convicted Majidreza Rahnavard of the killings and he was publicly hanged, less than a month after allegations were made that he had stabbed the pair in anger over security forces killing protesters.

Authorities publicly hanged him on Monday from a construction crane as a gruesome warning to others, the Associated Press reported.

The execution highlighted the speed at which Iran now carries out death sentences handed down for those detained in the demonstrations the government hopes to put down.

Activists 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, and another 18,200 people have been detained by authorities.

Iran's Mizan news agency, under the country's judiciary, alleged Mr Rahnavard had stabbed two security force members to death on 17 November in the city of Mashhad and wounded four others.

The agency said the execution took place on Monday morning in public in Mashhad.

The execution was carried out after footage was 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 clip showed the same man, which state TV alleged was Mr Rahnavard, then stab another person before the assailant fled.

Iran’s Mizan news agency falls under the country’s judiciary.

The Mizan report identified the dead as "student" Basij, which are paramilitary volunteers under Iran's Revolutionary Guard.

The Basij have been deployed in major cities, and been documented attacking and detaining protesters, who in many cases have fought back.

A heavily edited state television report aired after Mr Rahnavard's 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.

The Mizan report accused Mr Rahnavard of trying to flee to a foreign country when he was arrested.

Mizan also published a collage of images of Rahnavard hanging from the crane, his hands and feet bound, a black bag over his head.

Mashhad, a Shiite holy city, is located some 740 kilometres (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 death of 22-year-old Mahsa Amini in custody on September 16, after she had been detained by Iran's morality police.

Mizan said Mr Rahnavard was convicted in Mashhad's Revolutionary Court.

The tribunals have been internationally criticised for not allowing those on trial to pick their own lawyers or even see the evidence against them.

Mr Rahnavard had been convicted on the charge of “moharebeh,” a Farsi word meaning “waging war against God.”

That charge has been levied against others in the decades since the 1979 Islamic Revolution and carries the death penalty.

From Brussels, the European Union's foreign ministers expressed dismay at the latest execution.

On Monday, the bloc was poised to approve a fresh series of sanctions against Iran over its crackdown on protestors, and also for supplying drones to Russia for use in its war against Ukraine, the bloc’s top diplomat said.

EU foreign policy chief Josp Borrell said he spoke to Iran’s foreign minister regarding Tehran’s response to the protests and the latest execution and added that it was “not an easy conversation.”

“We are going to approve a very, very tough package of sanctions,” Borrell told reporters as he arrived to chair the ministerial meeting in Brussels.

Finland’s foreign minister said that he also called his Iranian counterpart.

German Foreign Minister Annalena Baerbock described the execution as “a blatant attempt at intimidation” of Iranians.

“We are making clear that we stand beside innocent people in Iran,” Baerbock said as she arrived at the Brussels meeting.

“A system that treats its people in this way cannot expect to continue to have halfway normal relations with the European Union.”

Iran is one of the world’s most prolific executioners and typically practises capital punish,emt by hanging. It executed the first prisoner detained during demonstrations last Thursday.

Amnesty International has said it obtained a document signed by one senior Iranian police commander asking that the execution for one prisoner be “completed in the shortest possible time" and that his death sentence be carried out in public as "a heart-warming gesture towards the security forces.”

Amid 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.

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