Azerbaijan, Baku, 11 September / Trend corr. D.Khatinoglu/ Iran's top position in the world teenager execution rating is the result of executions under pretext of revenge implemented in the country. "Teenagers are executed in Iran under the pretext of revenge," Deputy Chairman of France-based International Human Rights Federation Abdolkarim Lihiji said to Trend .
On 11 September, Human Right Watching said in its report that 32 teenagers had been executed worldwide since January 2005 - 26 in Iran, 2 in Sudan, 2 in Saudi Arabia, 1 in Pakistan, 1 in Yemen.
According to Lahiji, since the Islamic Revolution Iran has joined only the Children Rights Convention of the International Human Rights Convention. But in fact the country does not observe even this convention. "In Iran, legal liability is stipulated by the Shariat (Islamic) laws - boys attain their majority when they are 14.5 years and girls when they are 9. And that is contradicts to international laws," Lahiji said. According to international laws, the full age for boys and girls is 18.
Lahiji added that only authorities and justice system have the right to punish. But in Iran punishment of a person who committed a murder is contingent on victim's family. "If victim's family receives compensation and withdraws its action or agrees to release the criminal, he/she will be justified; otherwise he/she will be executed.
And this contradicts the contemporary laws of punishment, i.e., murder in Iran became a special question. For example, several years ago the son of the former Ministry of Security of Iran Ali Fallahiyani committed murdering, but did not sit in the prison even for a day. Or son of one of the ideologists of the Iranian Government, Jalaladdin Farsini, also committed murdering. They both satisfied the family of victims and they were freed," Lahiji told be telephone from Paris on 11 September.
He noted that the punishments are made with respect to some behaviors according to the regulations of Shariat. "In Islam the alcoholic drinks or extramarital sexual relations are considered sin (haram), and those, who did this, are punished. But according to the international laws, these acts relate to personal questions, and they can be realized, not bringing harms to others. In Iran, heinous punishments are introduced with respect to adolescents, who use alcoholic drinks or entered sexual relation without the marriage," said the Chairman of the International Human Rights Federation.
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