Mohammad Qobadlou, who was arrested after taking part in the Woman, Life, Freedom protests that swept Iran after the killing of Mahsa Amini in 2022, was executed by the regime on Tuesday morning, the Mizan News Agency, affiliated with Iran's judiciary, confirmed.
Qobadlou was sentenced to death in late 2022, in the middle of the protests, on charges of killing a police officer and of "corruption on earth." In January of last year, after reports that his execution was imminent after he was transferred to solitary confinement, Iranian protesters gathered at the Rajaei-Shahr Prison in Karaj to protest the planned execution. Some of those protesters have since been arrested as well.
دریافتی از زندان قزلحصار، مادر و خاله #محمد_قبادلو به ماموران زندان میگویند؛ «محمد من را شما کشتید. اون به خاطر همه شما جوونها به خیابون رفت.» pic.twitter.com/sZZ7PC5YeU
— Amirhossein Miresmaeili (@AmirMiresmaeili) January 23, 2024
Just a day before those protests, Iranian protesters Mohammad Mehdi Karami and Seyyed Mohammad Hosseini were executed by the Iranian regime.
In July of last year, the Iranian Supreme Court overturned Qobadlou's death sentence, but, on Monday, Qobadlou's lawyer, Amir Raisian, announced on X that he had received a notice from the prosecutor's office that the execution was going to be carried out regardless on Tuesday morning.
Raisian stressed that the decision to carry out the execution is "against the law and is undoubtedly considered murder."
In the hours leading up to the execution, Qobadlou's father and mother gathered in front of the prison where he was being held. A photo from the scene showed Qobadlou's father wrapped in a blanket in front of the prison.
Another video reportedly from after the execution showed Qobadlou's mother shouting at the prison guards "you killed my Mohammad! He took to the streets for all of you young people!"
Protests after Mahsa Amini death drew attention around the world
In the fall and winter of 2022, intense nationwide demonstrations, commonly referred to as the “Woman, Life, Liberty” (“Jin, Jiyan, Azadî” in Kurdish) protests, swept Iran after Mahsa Amini, an Iranian-Kurdish woman, was arrested and beaten by “morality police” officers in Tehran in mid-September of 2022 for allegedly incorrectly wearing her hijab. Amini died shortly after due to her wounds.
The protests drew the world’s attention, with videos showing demonstrators openly clashing with Iranian security forces in an unprecedented way. In a number of videos shared online, armed security forces could be seen fleeing as masses of protesters confronted their attempts to suppress the demonstrations.
In August, the commander-in-chief of Iran's Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC), Hossein Salami, called the protests “the strongest, most dangerous, and most serious” such demonstrations in the regime’s history.