Amnesty International said in a statement on Wednesday that Iranian authorities have failed to provide accountability for at least 72 deaths in custody since January 2010, despite credible reports that they resulted from torture or other ill-treatment or the lethal use of firearms and tear gas by officials.
Amnesty International issued its latest statement following reports of yet another suspicious death in custody.
In the statement, the death of Yaser Mangouri, aged 31, whose death was reported to his family by ministry of intelligence officials in Urumieh, has been mentioned as the most recent case.
According to AI, since January 2010, at least 72 deaths occurred at 42 prisons and detention centres in 16 provinces across the country.
Not a single official has since been held to account for these deaths, reflecting Iran’s long-standing crisis of impunity where allegations of torture and unlawful killings consistently go uninvestigated and unpunished.
Heba Morayef, Middle East and North Africa Regional Director at Amnesty International said “Yesterday’s reports of the death of Yaser Mangouri in suspicious circumstances further exposes how the prevailing climate of impunity further emboldens security forces to violate prisoners’ right to life without any fear of consequence or accountability. The authorities’ systemic refusal to conduct any independent investigations into these deaths in custody is a grim reflection of the normalisation of the arbitrary deprivation of life by state authorities.”
“Ensuring respect for people’s right to life requires that officials suspected of torturing prisoners to death are criminally investigated, and if enough admissible evidence against them is found, prosecuted. Lack of investigations constitutes in and of itself a violation of the right to life,” Morayef added.
The Amnesty International statement states that in 46 of the deaths in custody cases, informed sources including the relatives and/or fellow inmates of the deceased reported that the death resulted from physical torture or other ill-treatment at the hands of intelligence and security agents or prison officials.
A further 15 followed the lethal use of firearms and/or tear gas by prison security guards to suppress prison protests over Covid-19 safety fears, according to credible sources. In the remaining 11 cases, the deaths occurred in suspicious circumstances, but no further details about potential causes were available. The majority of deaths recorded took place since 2015.
