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Iranian Authorities Execute Kurdish Man after 15 Years in Prison

Activists warn of a new surge in hangings in Iran (Ludovic MARIN / AFP)
Activists warn of a new surge in hangings in Iran (Ludovic MARIN / AFP)
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Iranian Authorities Execute Kurdish Man after 15 Years in Prison

Activists warn of a new surge in hangings in Iran (Ludovic MARIN / AFP)
Activists warn of a new surge in hangings in Iran (Ludovic MARIN / AFP)

Iranian authorities on Thursday executed Kurdish man Kamran Sheikheh, the last surviving defendant in a case linked to a cleric's killing in 2008, rights groups said.
Sheikheh, charged of “corruption on Earth,” was put to death in Urmia prison in northwestern Iran, the Norway-based Iran Human Rights (IHR) and US-based Human Rights Activists News Agency (HRANA) said in separate statements.
He was arrested in 2009 and was sentenced to death with six other prisoners by a branch of the Tehran Revolutionary Court, presided over by Judge Mohammad Moghiseh.
Sheikheh's six co-defendants had all been executed in separate hangings between November 2023 and May 2024.
Amnesty International has said they had been sentenced to death “in a grossly unfair trial” that had been “marred by allegations of torture and other ill-treatment,” according to AFP.
IHR described Sheikheh as a “political prisoner” who had been sentenced to death “based on torture-tainted confessions in a grossly unfair trial.”
The execution “was unlawful according to international law and the Islamic republic's own laws, amounting to an extrajudicial killing,” said IHR director Mahmood Amiry-Moghaddam.
HRANA said that the proceedings related to the killing of an imam of a mosque in the northwestern city of Mahabad in September 2008.
Sheikheh and the six others were arrested in connection with the killing in January and February 2010 and sentenced to death in 2018.
Activists say that Iran's use of the death penalty disproportionately targets members of the Kurdish, Arab and Baluch ethnic minorities in western and southeast Iran.
In one of the latest cases, rights groups said the Revolutionary Court of Tehran had sentenced Pakhshan Azizi, a Kurdish woman held in the capital's Evin prison, to death on charges of “rebellion.”
Earlier this month, Iranian authorities sentenced to death another Kurdish woman, Sharifeh Mohammadi, on the same charges over accusations of links to an outlawed Kurdish organization.
IHR warned that Sheikheh's execution is part of a new surge in hangings in Iran marking the end of an apparent lull coinciding with snap presidential elections several weeks ago.
The rights group said at least 20 people have been executed since Saturday.
Iran executed 853 people in 2023, the highest number recorded since 2015, representing a 48% increase from 2022 in the wake of the protests that followed the death of 22-year-old Mahsa Amini.
The spike in death penalties has continued into 2024, with at least 95 recorded executions by March 20, according to Amnesty International.

 

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World

Russia's FSB Says Ukraine's SBU Was behind Assassination Attempt on Top General

In this image made from video and provided by the Russian Defense Ministry Press Service, on June 23, 2023, Lt. Gen. Vladimir Alexeyev speaks to servicemen in an undisclosed location. (Russian Defense Ministry Press Service via AP)
In this image made from video and provided by the Russian Defense Ministry Press Service, on June 23, 2023, Lt. Gen. Vladimir Alexeyev speaks to servicemen in an undisclosed location. (Russian Defense Ministry Press Service via AP)
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Russia's FSB Says Ukraine's SBU Was behind Assassination Attempt on Top General

In this image made from video and provided by the Russian Defense Ministry Press Service, on June 23, 2023, Lt. Gen. Vladimir Alexeyev speaks to servicemen in an undisclosed location. (Russian Defense Ministry Press Service via AP)
In this image made from video and provided by the Russian Defense Ministry Press Service, on June 23, 2023, Lt. Gen. Vladimir Alexeyev speaks to servicemen in an undisclosed location. (Russian Defense Ministry Press Service via AP)

Russia's Federal Security Service said on Monday that the men suspected of shooting one of the country's most senior military intelligence officer had confessed that they were carrying out orders from the Security Service of Ukraine (SBU).

Ukraine has denied any involvement in Friday's attempted assassination of Lieutenant General Vladimir Alexeyev, deputy head of Russia's ‌GRU military ‌intelligence service. Alexeyev has regained ‌consciousness ⁠after surgery, reported Reuters.

Russia ‌said that the suspected shooter, a Ukrainian-born Russian citizen named by Moscow as Lyubomir Korba, had been questioned after he was extradited from Dubai. A suspected accomplice, Viktor Vasin, has also been questioned.

The FSB said in ⁠a statement that both Korba and Vasin had "confessed their ‌guilt" and given details ‍of the shooting which ‍they said was "committed on behalf of ‍the Security Service of Ukraine."

The FSB did not provide any evidence that Reuters was able to immediately verify. It was not possible to contact the men while they were in detention in Russia. The SBU could ⁠not be reached for immediate comment on the FSB statement.

The FSB said Korba was recruited by the SBU in August 2025 in Ternopil, western Ukraine, underwent training in Kyiv and was paid monthly in crypto-currency. For killing Alexeyev, Korba was promised $30,000 by the SBU, the FSB said.

The FSB said Polish intelligence was involved in his recruitment. ‌Poland could not be reached for immediate comment.

World

Venezuela's Machado Says Ally 'Kidnapped' after His Release

Venezuelan political leader Juan Pablo Guanipa gestures after their release outside Zona 7 prison in Caracas on February 8, 2026. (Photo by Juan BARRETO / AFP)
Venezuelan political leader Juan Pablo Guanipa gestures after their release outside Zona 7 prison in Caracas on February 8, 2026. (Photo by Juan BARRETO / AFP)
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Venezuela's Machado Says Ally 'Kidnapped' after His Release

Venezuelan political leader Juan Pablo Guanipa gestures after their release outside Zona 7 prison in Caracas on February 8, 2026. (Photo by Juan BARRETO / AFP)
Venezuelan political leader Juan Pablo Guanipa gestures after their release outside Zona 7 prison in Caracas on February 8, 2026. (Photo by Juan BARRETO / AFP)

Venezuela's Nobel peace laureate Maria Corina Machado said on Monday that armed men "kidnapped" a close ally shortly after his release by authorities, following ex-leader Nicolas Maduro's capture.

The country's Public Prosecutor's Office confirmed later that same day that former National Assembly vice president Juan Pablo Guanipa, 61, was again taken into custody and to be put under house arrest, arguing that he violated the conditions of his release.

Guanipa would be placed under house arrest "in order to safeguard the criminal process," the office said in a statement on Monday. The conditions of Guanipa's release have yet to be made public.

Machado claimed that her close ally had been "kidnapped" in the capital Caracas by armed men "dressed in civilian clothes" who took him away by force.

"We demand his immediate release," she wrote on social media platform X.

The arrest came after his release from prison on Sunday along with two other opposition figures, and as lawmakers prepared to vote Tuesday on a historic amnesty law covering charges used to lock up dissidents in almost three decades of socialist rule, reported AFP.

Shortly after his release, Guanipa visited several detention centers in Caracas, where he met with relatives of political prisoners and spoke to the press.

Guanipa had appeared earlier Sunday in a video posted on his X account, showing what looked like his release papers.

"Here we are, being released," Guanipa said in the video, adding that he had spent "10 months in hiding, almost nine months detained here" in Caracas.

- 'Let's go to an electoral process' -

Speaking to AFP later on Sunday, he had called on the government to respect the 2024 presidential election, which opposition candidate Edmundo Gonzalez Urrutia was widely considered to have won. Maduro claimed victory and remained in power till January.

"Let's respect it. That's the basic thing, that's the logical thing. Oh, you don't want to respect it? Then let's go to an electoral process," Guanipa said.

The opposition ally of Machado was arrested in May 2025, in connection with an alleged conspiracy to undermine legislative and regional elections that were boycotted by the opposition.

He was charged with terrorism, money laundering and incitement to violence and hatred.

Guanipa had been in hiding prior to his arrest. He was last seen in public in January 2025, when he accompanied Machado to an anti-Maduro rally.

Following Maduro's capture by US special forces on January 3, authorities have started to slowly release political prisoners. Rights groups estimate that around 700 people are still waiting to be freed.

A former Machado legal advisor, Perkins Rocha, was also freed on Sunday. So was Freddy Superlano, who once won a gubernatorial election in Barinas, a city that is the home turf of the iconic late socialist leader Hugo Chavez.

"We hugged at home," Rocha's wife Maria Constanza Cipriani wrote on X, with a photo of them.

Machado, who was awarded the 2025 Nobel Peace Prize for her efforts to advance democracy in Venezuela, had initially celebrated Guanipa's release.

"My dear Juan Pablo, counting down the minutes until I can hug you! You are a hero, and history will ALWAYS recognize it. Freedom for ALL political prisoners!!" she wrote on X on Sunday.

NGO Foro Penal said it had confirmed the release of 35 prisoners on Sunday. It said that since January 8 nearly 400 people arrested for political reasons have been freed thus far.

Lawmakers gave their initial backing to a draft amnesty last week which covered the types of crimes used to lock up dissidents during 27 years of socialist rule.

But Venezuela's largest opposition coalition denounced "serious omissions" in the proposed amnesty measures on Friday.

Meanwhile, relatives of prisoners are growing increasingly impatient for their loved ones to be freed.

Acting president Delcy Rodriguez, who was Maduro's vice president, is pushing the amnesty bill as a milestone on the path to reconciliation.

Rodriguez took power in Venezuela with the blessing of US President Donald Trump, who is eyeing American access to what are the world's largest proven oil reserves.

As part of its reforms, Rodriguez's government has taken steps towards opening up the oil industry and restoring diplomatic ties with Washington, which were severed by Maduro in 2019.

World

SKorea Grounds Aging Attack Choppers after Fatal Training Crash

South Korean military officials secure the site where an AH-1S Cobra attack helicopter crashed in Gapyeong, South Korea, February 9, 2026. Yonhap via REUTERS
South Korean military officials secure the site where an AH-1S Cobra attack helicopter crashed in Gapyeong, South Korea, February 9, 2026. Yonhap via REUTERS
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SKorea Grounds Aging Attack Choppers after Fatal Training Crash

South Korean military officials secure the site where an AH-1S Cobra attack helicopter crashed in Gapyeong, South Korea, February 9, 2026. Yonhap via REUTERS
South Korean military officials secure the site where an AH-1S Cobra attack helicopter crashed in Gapyeong, South Korea, February 9, 2026. Yonhap via REUTERS

South Korea grounded an aging fleet of military helicopters on Monday after a chopper crashed during a training exercise and killed two people on board.

The AH-1S Cobra was training for emergency landings when it "crashed due to an unidentified cause" in Gapyeong county west of Seoul, the army said in a statement.

Two service members were taken to hospital and later pronounced dead, AFP reported.

Photos in local media showed the helicopter's crumpled fuselage lying on a rocky river bank.

"Following the accident, the Army has suspended operations of all aircraft of the same model" and is investigating the cause, the forces said.

The AH-1S Cobra is a US-made, single-engine anti-tank attack helicopter.

Some of those used by South Korea's military are more than 30 years old. It is not clear how many are currently in service.

The country's defense acquisition agency said in 2022 that the Army's Cobra helicopters were "scheduled to be retired" as domestically developed light-armed choppers started flying.