Iran executes man for alleged links to Israel and membership in banned opposition group

Judiciary claims Sultan-Ali Shirzadi-Fakhr was part of People’s Mujahedeen of Iran, collaborated with Mossad; regime has stepped up executions, drawing accusations of repression

TEHRAN — Iran hanged a man on Thursday after he was convicted of membership in a banned opposition group and alleged collaboration with Israel, the judiciary said.

“Sultan-Ali Shirzadi-Fakhr was hanged early this morning for membership in the terrorist group” of the People’s Mujahedeen of Iran (MEK) and “collaboration with the Israeli regime’s spy service,” the judiciary’s Mizan Online website reported.

He was also convicted of a capital offense that in Persian means waging war against God, accused of taking part in operations hostile to the Islamic Republic, Mizan said.

It was not clear when he was arrested.

Mizan said Shirzadi-Fakhr had lived in Spain for a period, but it was not clear whether he held another passport.

The execution is the latest in recent weeks during the war with Israel and the United States, in which authorities have carried out multiple executions of people linked to pre-war protests or affiliated with the MEK.

On Wednesday, US President Donald Trump said Iran had halted alleged plans to execute eight women arrested over pre-war anti-government protests after he urged Tehran to release them.

Iran’s judiciary dismissed the claim as “false news” and said the women were never at risk of execution.

Iran is the world’s second most prolific executioner after China, according to rights groups based outside the country, and Iranian officials have warned there will be no leniency for anyone deemed to have collaborated with Israel. Iran avowedly seeks Israel’s destruction.

Earlier this month, Iran’s hardline judiciary chief urged courts to speed up verdicts linked to the US-Israeli war, including capital punishment, as activists sounded the alarm about surging hangings of convicts seen as political prisoners.

Amnesty International has said that these executions have shown the judiciary to be “a tool of repression, sending individuals to the gallows to spread fear and exacting revenge on those demanding fundamental political change.”