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Iran Hangs Three Baluch Men over 2019 'Terrorist Attacks'

A photo published by Mizan agency of the unrest in the city of Zahedan, the capital of Baluchistan province, on July 8.
A photo published by Mizan agency of the unrest in the city of Zahedan, the capital of Baluchistan province, on July 8.
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Iran Hangs Three Baluch Men over 2019 'Terrorist Attacks'

A photo published by Mizan agency of the unrest in the city of Zahedan, the capital of Baluchistan province, on July 8.
A photo published by Mizan agency of the unrest in the city of Zahedan, the capital of Baluchistan province, on July 8.

Iran hanged on Monday three men who were convicted of carrying out “terrorist activities” in the restive southeastern province of Sistan-Baluchistan, the judiciary said.

According to the judiciary’s Mizan news agency, the three Baluch men are Mohammad Barahouyi Anjomani, Mohammad Karim Barkazayi Akson and Edris Bilrani who were sentenced to death on charges of corruption and participating in terrorist acts.

They were also found guilty of being part of the Jaish al-Adl (Army of Justice) group, which was formed in 2012 and is blacklisted by Iran as a “terrorist” organization, according to Mizan.

The Army of Justice group says it is a “resistance movement” fighting for the ethnic rights of the Baluch.

The three men were sentenced to death after they were found guilty of bombing attacks targeting a police station and a patrol vehicle in Zahedan, the capital of Sistan-Baluchistan province, in 2019.

Also, bomb-making tools were confiscated in one of the convicts’ houses during a search, AFP reported.

The chief justice of Sistan and Baluchestan province Ali Mostafavinia said the provincial amnesty committee opposed a proposal to pardon the three convicts.

In September, gunmen carried out an attack in the province killing two policemen.

On Monday, Iran's official IRNA news agency said a conscript was killed and two others injured in a confrontation with an armed group near the border with Pakistan.

Bordering Pakistan and Afghanistan, the province of Sistan and Baluchestan is the scene of frequent clashes between police on the one hand, and drug traffickers and opposition Baluch groups on the other.

More than 600 people have been executed by Iran so far this year, already the highest figure in eight years, said the Norway-based Iran Human Rights (IHR) group in a November report.

“The international community must react to more than 600 executions in 10 months — that's two state murders a day,” said IHR Director Mahmood Amiry-Moghaddam.

The IHR's tally of 604 executions so far this year is already higher than the 582 recorded in 2022, and the most since 2015 when it registered 972 executions.

Activists have expressed dismay over the surge in drug-related executions after previously falling due to amendments in Iran's criminal code.

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Lavrov: Russia’s Relations with Syria Are Strategic, We Don’t Want Weak Truce in Ukraine

Russia's Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov attends a meeting with Vladislav Deinego, head of the Foreign Ministry of the self-proclaimed Lugansk People's Republic, and Sergei Peresada, deputy head of the Foreign Ministry of the self-proclaimed Donetsk People's Republic, in Moscow, Russia February 25, 2022. (Russian Foreign Ministry/Handout via Reuters)
Russia's Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov attends a meeting with Vladislav Deinego, head of the Foreign Ministry of the self-proclaimed Lugansk People's Republic, and Sergei Peresada, deputy head of the Foreign Ministry of the self-proclaimed Donetsk People's Republic, in Moscow, Russia February 25, 2022. (Russian Foreign Ministry/Handout via Reuters)
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Lavrov: Russia’s Relations with Syria Are Strategic, We Don’t Want Weak Truce in Ukraine

Russia's Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov attends a meeting with Vladislav Deinego, head of the Foreign Ministry of the self-proclaimed Lugansk People's Republic, and Sergei Peresada, deputy head of the Foreign Ministry of the self-proclaimed Donetsk People's Republic, in Moscow, Russia February 25, 2022. (Russian Foreign Ministry/Handout via Reuters)
Russia's Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov attends a meeting with Vladislav Deinego, head of the Foreign Ministry of the self-proclaimed Lugansk People's Republic, and Sergei Peresada, deputy head of the Foreign Ministry of the self-proclaimed Donetsk People's Republic, in Moscow, Russia February 25, 2022. (Russian Foreign Ministry/Handout via Reuters)

Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said on Thursday that the new ruler of Syria had called relations with Russia long standing and strategic and that Moscow shared this assessment.

Kremlin foreign policy aide Yuri Ushakov said on Monday that Russia was in contact with Syria's new administration at both a diplomatic and military level.

On Ukraine, Lavrov said Russia sees no point in a weak ceasefire to freeze the war in Ukraine, but Moscow wants a legally binding deal for a lasting peace that would ensure the security of both Russia and its neighbors.

"A truce is a path to nowhere," Lavrov said, adding that Moscow suspected such a weak truce would be simply used by the West to re-arm Ukraine.

"We need final legal agreements that will fix all the conditions for ensuring the security of the Russian Federation and, of course, the legitimate security interests of our neighbors," Lavrov said.

He added that Moscow wanted the legal documents drafted in such a way to ensure "the impossibility of violating these agreements."

Reuters reported last month that President Vladimir Putin is open to discussing a Ukraine ceasefire deal with Donald Trump but rules out making any major territorial concessions and insists Kyiv abandon ambitions to join NATO.

Putin said last week that he was ready to compromise over Ukraine in possible talks with US President-elect Donald Trump on ending the war and had no conditions for starting talks with the Ukrainian authorities.

Putin said the fighting was complex, so it was "difficult and pointless to guess what lies ahead... (but) we are moving, as you said, towards solving our primary tasks, which we outlined at the beginning of the special military operation."

Trump, who has repeatedly said he will end the war, said on Sunday that Putin wanted to meet with him. Russia says there have been no contacts with the incoming Trump administration.

Trump's Ukraine envoy, Retired Lieutenant-General Keith Kellogg, will travel to Kyiv and several other European capitals in early January as the next administration tries to bring a swift end to the Russia-Ukraine war, according to two sources with knowledge of the trip's planning.

"I really hope that the administration of Mr. Trump, including Mr. Kellogg, will get involved in the root causes of the conflict. We are always ready for consultations," Lavrov said.

Putin says an arrogant West led by the United States ignored Russia's post-Soviet interests, tried to pull Ukraine into its orbit since 2014 and then used Ukraine to fight a proxy war aimed at weakening - and ultimately destroying - Russia.

After a pro-Russian president was toppled in Ukraine's 2014 Maidan Revolution, Russia annexed Crimea and began giving military support to pro-Russian separatists in eastern Ukraine.

The West says Russia's 2022 invasion of Ukraine was an imperial-style land grab by Moscow that has strengthened the NATO military alliance and weakened Russia.

President Volodymyr Zelenskiy said on Sunday that Ukraine's membership of NATO is "achievable", but that Kyiv will have to fight to persuade allies to make it happen.

Moscow says the prospect of Ukraine joining NATO was one of the principal justifications for its invasion. Russia has said it any NATO membership for Ukraine would make any peace deal impossible.