One Year On, Iranian Dissident’s Execution Rattles Exiles

Ruhollah Zam was executed weeks after leaving France on a mysterious trip to Iraq - AFP
Ruhollah Zam was executed weeks after leaving France on a mysterious trip to Iraq - AFP
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One Year On, Iranian Dissident’s Execution Rattles Exiles

Ruhollah Zam was executed weeks after leaving France on a mysterious trip to Iraq - AFP
Ruhollah Zam was executed weeks after leaving France on a mysterious trip to Iraq - AFP

One year after dissident Ruhollah Zam was executed in Iran after apparently being lured from France, his hanging strikes fear into Iranian opposition exiles over the reach of the Islamic Republic.

Zam, the founder of a popular Telegram channel despised by the Iranian authorities for its use in November 2019 protests, was executed on December 12 last year just weeks after leaving France, where he had refugee status, on a mysterious trip to Iraq.

Colleagues say he was abducted in Iraq by Iranian forces, taken over the border, paraded on TV, forced to take part in a televised "confession", convicted and then hanged with astonishing speed, AFP reported.

Activists argue that his abduction and killing is part of a long history of reprisals carried out by Iran against opponents living outside its borders, dating back to the first months after the Islamic Revolution in 1979.

Friends of Zam remain baffled how a man described as passionate in his work and devoted to his daughter chose to make the risky journey to Iraq, a country with a major Iranian presence, and want answers from France over what happened.

Sepideh Pooraghaiee, an Iranian journalist living in exile in France who was a friend of Zam, told AFP that "many things are not clear. We do not know anything."

"We demand justice for a journalist who was assassinated and work to keep his memory intact."

The United For Zam association of friends and activists set up to keep his memory alive said that the French government "needed to clear up any ambiguities" about how Zam was abducted in Iraq.

Echoing frustration from activists that human rights are not part of the talks over the Iranian nuclear crisis, they called on France "to make negotiations with the Islamic Republic conditional on the cessation of killings and brutal repression of political dissidents".

- 'Seriously increasing risk' -

Campaigners accuse Iran of killing and abducting hundreds of opponents during the four decade since the royalist government of the shah was overthrown.

Among the most notorious was the knifing to death of the shah's last prime minister Shahpour Bakhtiar and his secretary outside Paris in August 1991.

An Iranian man, Ali Vakili Rad, was convicted of the killing but in 2010 was paroled by France and returned to Iran where he was given a hero's welcome.

The September 1992 killing of four Iranian Kurdish activists at the Mykonos restaurant in Berlin resulted in a German arrest warrant for the Iranian intelligence minister and a crisis in relations between Iran and the West.

"The kidnapping and subsequent killing of Ruhollah Zam fits a decades-long pattern of intimidation, extrajudicial killings and abductions of dissidents by the Islamic Republic of Iran´s agents," said Roya Boroumand, executive director of the US-based Abdorrahman Boroumand Center.

The Center has counted more than 540 Iranians whose successful assassination or kidnapping have been attributed to Iran, with a peak reached in the 1990s with more than 397 killed including 329 in Iraqi Kurdistan.

Boroumand said that there had been a "slackening" of such activities after the international backlash that followed the Mykonos case.

But a growing number of cases "indicate a seriously increasing risk" for Iranian dissidents abroad.

She linked this to the growing number of web-based channels based abroad that have had an impact inside Iran -- like Zam's Amadnews -- especially during events such as the 2019 protests.

In July this year, US prosecutors charged four Iranians in absentia over a plot to kidnap the dissident Masih Alinejad from New York in a speedboat and take her to Tehran's ally Venezuela.

Alinejad, who has strongly campaigned against the obligatory hijab in Iran, is now part of a bipartisan US Senate effort to introduce legislation that would sanction those behind such attempts.

Now living in a safe house after the plot was foiled, Alinejad said: "Even here in America I do not have a normal life. I am not a criminal. My crime is just to give a voice to the voiceless protesters of Iran."



Vance and Wife to Tour US Military Base in Greenland after Diplomatic Spat over Uninvited Visit

FILE - Vice President JD Vance leaves after speaking at the Congressional Cities Conference of the National League of Cities on Monday, March 10, 2025, in Washington. (AP Photo/Mark Schiefelbein, file)
FILE - Vice President JD Vance leaves after speaking at the Congressional Cities Conference of the National League of Cities on Monday, March 10, 2025, in Washington. (AP Photo/Mark Schiefelbein, file)
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Vance and Wife to Tour US Military Base in Greenland after Diplomatic Spat over Uninvited Visit

FILE - Vice President JD Vance leaves after speaking at the Congressional Cities Conference of the National League of Cities on Monday, March 10, 2025, in Washington. (AP Photo/Mark Schiefelbein, file)
FILE - Vice President JD Vance leaves after speaking at the Congressional Cities Conference of the National League of Cities on Monday, March 10, 2025, in Washington. (AP Photo/Mark Schiefelbein, file)

US Vice President JD Vance and his wife are due to visit an American military base in Greenland on Friday in a trip that was scaled back after an uproar among Greenlanders and Danes who were irked that the original itinerary was planned without consulting them.

The couple's revised trip to the semi-autonomous Danish territory comes as relations between the US and the Nordic country have soured after US President Donald Trump repeatedly suggested that the United States should in some form control the mineral-rich territory of Denmark — a traditional US ally and NATO member.

Friday's one-day visit to the US Space Force outpost at Pituffik, on the northwest coast of Greenland, has removed the risk of potentially violating diplomatic custom by sending a delegation to another country without an official invitation. It will also reduce the likelihood that Vance and his wife will cross paths with residents angered by Trump’s annexation announcements.

Ahead of the visit, four of the five parties elected to Greenland's parliament earlier this month agreed to form a new, broad-based coalition government, banding together in the face of Trump's designs on the territory.

Danish Prime Minister Mette Frederiksen said on Tuesday that the visit, which was originally set for three days, created “unacceptable pressure." On Thursday she was cited by Danish public broadcaster DR as saying: “We really want to work with the Americans on defense and security in the kingdom. But Greenland belongs to the Greenlanders.”

Initially, Usha Vance had announced a solo trip to the Avannaata Qimussersu dogsled race in Sisimiut. Her husband then subsequently said he would join her on that trip, only to change that itinerary again — after protests from Greenland and Denmark — to a one-day visit of the couple to the military post only.

Nonetheless, in an interview on Wednesday, Trump repeated his desire for US control of Greenland. Asked if the people there were “eager” to become US citizens, Trump said he didn’t know “but I think we have to do it, and we have to convince them.”

Inhabitants of Greenland's capital, Nuuk — which is about 1,500 kilometers (930 miles) south of Pituffik — voiced concern about Vance's visit and the US interest in their island.

Cora Høy, 22, said Vance was “welcome if he wants to see it but of course Greenland is not for sale.” She added that “it’s not normal around here” with all the attention Greenland is getting. "I feel now every day is about (Trump) and I just want to get away from it.”

“It’s all a bit crazy. Of course the population here is a bit shook up,” said 30-year-old Inuk Kristensen. "My opinion is the same as everyone’s: Of course you don’t do things this way. You don’t just come here and say that you want to buy the place.”

As the nautical gateway to the Arctic and North Atlantic approaches to North America, Greenland has broader strategic value as both China and Russia seek access to its waterways and natural resources.

During his first term, Trump floated the idea of purchasing the world’s largest island, even as Denmark insisted it wasn’t for sale. The people of Greenland also have firmly rejected Trump’s plans.

Vance has several times criticized long-standing European allies for relying on military support from the United States, openly antagonizing partners in ways that have generated concerns about the reliability of the US.

Opponents of Trump's plans to control Greenland announced a rally in front of the American embassy in the Danish capital for Saturday, DR reported Thursday.