IRAN PUBLICLY FLOGS YOUNG MAN FOR DRINKING ALCOHOL

July 10, 2018:

A young man was publicly flogged in eastern city of Kashmar, in Razavi Khorasan Province, the state-run Young Journalist Club website reported.
The young old victim, identified by the state media as M.R was sentenced to 80 lashes for drinking alcohol beverages 10 years ago at the age of 15 or 16, in a wedding party where he got engaged in a fight leading to the death of a 17 year old man.
The city’s prosecutor stated that M.R did not collaborate in murder and the sentence of the main murderer had been carried out before. But he was involved in the fight and his sentence will be carried out.
“The judiciary would seriously and decisively deal with those drink beverages or involve in fights, particularly in wedding praties,” he added.
Torture and merciless punishment have been institutionalized in the regime’s punishment laws and is sanctioned by the Judiciary as well as the regime officials.
Hadi Sadeghi, Deputy Chancellor of the Judiciary was quoted by the state-run ISNA news agency on May 30, 2018, as saying, “There is no precepts of imprisonment in Islam, so we need to seek alternative punishments. Physical punishment is much more effective than imprisonment, and the punishment of flogging is much more effective in Islam. But, the human rights agencies do not have a good idea on this matter.”
Under the regime’s laws, at least 148 crimes are punishable by flogging and 20 others are punishable by amputation. Sentences which are considered torture by human rights defenders and the international law.
What Amnesty International has pointed out in its report of January 18, 2017 is: “As a party to the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR), Iran is legally obliged to forbid torture and other cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment. However, Iranian law continues to allow internationally banned corporal punishments including amputation, stoning and flogging and claims to justify it in the name of protecting religious morals.”