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Human Rights Groups Demand Investigation Into Death of Imprisoned Iranian Protester

Iranian imprisoned protester Javad Rouhi
Iranian imprisoned protester Javad Rouhi
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Human Rights Groups Demand Investigation Into Death of Imprisoned Iranian Protester

Iranian imprisoned protester Javad Rouhi
Iranian imprisoned protester Javad Rouhi

Human rights groups on Friday called for an investigation into the death in prison of an Iranian man originally sentenced to death in connection with last year's protests triggered by the death in custody of Mahsa Amini.

On Thursday, Iran’s judiciary announced that Javad Rouhi, an inmate in Nowshahr city prison, was transferred to Shahid Beheshti Hospital in the city early Thursday after suffering a seizure while in prison, AFP reported.

Rouhi, 31, was sentenced to death last January on the charge of “corruption on Earth” in Nowshahr in the northern province of Mazandaran and “apostasy by desecration of the Koran by burning it.”

Later in May, the death sentence was struck down and a retrial ordered.

Human Rights Watch said on Friday that Rouhi died under suspicious circumstances on August 31, 2023, in northern Iran, raising grave concerns about his treatment.

“He was horrifically tortured following his arrest during the widespread protests that erupted in Iran in September 2022 and convicted two months later after an unfair trial.”

Tara Sepehri Far, senior Iran researcher at HRW, said the Iranian prison authorities' egregious record of torture and mistreatment makes Javad Rouhi's death in custody more than a little suspicious.

She added, “An international inquiry is needed since there's no reason to believe Iranian authorities will carry out a transparent investigation.”

According to HRW, which cited an informed source, Rouhi had in custody suffered torture including being exposed to freezing temperatures and having ice cubes placed on his testicles and other parts of his body for 48-hour periods.

“He experienced a concussion in detention as a result of torture and was transferred to a hospital for 24 hours,” it added.

Rouhi died almost a year after a nationwide protest movement was triggered by the September 16 death in custody of Iranian Kurd Amini.

The 22-year-old had been detained for allegedly breaching the Islamic republic's strict dress code for women.

During months of protest, which Tehran called foreign-instigated “riots,” thousands of Iranians were arrested and hundreds killed, including dozens of security personnel.

Seven men have been executed in cases related to the protests that involved killings and violence against members of the security forces.

“The United Nations fact-finding mission should investigate all torture and deaths in custody related to the protests in Iran,” Sepehri Far said. “Sadly, the case of Javad Rouhi is just the latest one.”

Also, Norway-based Iran Human Rights (IHR) echoed that Rouhi died “under suspicious circumstances.”

IHR's director, Mahmood Amiry-Moghaddam, said Rouhi's death must be investigated “as an extrajudicial killing in prison” by the UN fact-finding mission set up to investigate human right abuse committed during Iran's crackdown on the protests.

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Global Interest in Israel's Air-Launched Ballistic Missiles

This handout picture released by the Israeli army on October 26, 2024, shows an Israeli fighter jet departing a hangar at an undisclosed location in Israel. (Photo by AFP)
This handout picture released by the Israeli army on October 26, 2024, shows an Israeli fighter jet departing a hangar at an undisclosed location in Israel. (Photo by AFP)
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Global Interest in Israel's Air-Launched Ballistic Missiles

This handout picture released by the Israeli army on October 26, 2024, shows an Israeli fighter jet departing a hangar at an undisclosed location in Israel. (Photo by AFP)
This handout picture released by the Israeli army on October 26, 2024, shows an Israeli fighter jet departing a hangar at an undisclosed location in Israel. (Photo by AFP)

Israel's effective use of air-launched ballistic missiles in its airstrikes against Iran is expected to pique interest elsewhere in acquiring the weapons, which most major powers have avoided in favor of cruise missiles and glide bombs.
The Israeli Army said its Oct. 26 raid knocked out Iranian missile factories and air defenses in three waves of strikes.
Researchers said that based on satellite imagery, targets included buildings once used in Iran's nuclear program, according to Reuters.
Tehran defends such targets with “a huge variety” of anti-aircraft systems, said Justin Bronk, an airpower and technology expert at London's Royal United Services Institute.
Cruise missiles are easier targets for dense, integrated air defenses than ballistic missiles are.
But ballistic missiles are often fired from known launch points, and most cannot change course in flight.
Experts say high-speed, highly accurate air-launched ballistic missiles such as the Israel Aerospace Industries Rampage get around problems facing ground-based ballistic missiles and air-launched cruise missiles - weapons that use small wings to fly great distances and maintain altitude.
“The main advantage of an ALBM over an ALCM is speed to penetrate defenses,” said Jeffrey Lewis, director of the East Asia Nonproliferation Program at the James Martin Centre for Nonproliferation Studies at the Middlebury Institute of International Studies in California.
“The downside - accuracy - looks to have been largely solved,” he said.
Ground-launched ballistic missiles - which Iran used to attack Israel twice this year, and which both Ukraine and Russia have used since Russia's invasion in 2022 - are common in the arsenals of many countries. So, too, are cruise missiles.
Because ALBMs are carried by aircraft, their launch points are flexible, helping strike planners.
“The advantage is that being air-launched, they can come from any direction, complicating the task of defending against them,” said Uzi Rubin, a senior researcher at the Jerusalem Institute for Strategy and Security, one of the architects of Israel's missile defenses.
The weapons are not invulnerable to air defenses. In Ukraine, Lockheed Martin Patriot PAC-3 missiles have repeatedly intercepted Russia's Khinzhals.
Many countries, including the United States and Britain, experimented with ALBMs during the Cold War. Only Israel, Russia and China are known to field the weapons now.
The US tested a hypersonic ALBM, the Lockheed Martin AGM-183, but it received no funding for the 2025 fiscal year.
Because it has a large arsenal of cruise missiles and other types of long-range strike weapons, Washington has otherwise shown little interest in ALBMs.
A US Air Force official, speaking on condition of anonymity, said ALBMs are not used in Air Force operations.
Raytheon's SM-6, an air-defense missile that has been repurposed for air-to-air and surface-to-surface missions, also has been tested as an air-launched anti-ship weapon, said a senior US defense technical analyst, who declined to be identified because the matter is sensitive.
In tests the missile was able to strike a small target on land representing the center of mass of a destroyer, the analyst said. Publicly, the SM-6 is not meant for air-to-ground strikes.
Because ALBMs are essentially a combination of guidance, warheads and rocket motors, many countries that have precision weapons already have the capability to pursue them, a defense industry executive said on condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of the matter.
“This is a clever way of taking a common set of technologies and components and turning it into a very interesting new weapon that gives them far more capability, and therefore options, at a reasonable price,” the executive said.