Iranian Pro-Reform Journalist’s Capital Punishment Upheld

Iran’s Supreme Court on Tuesday upheld a death sentence against Ruhollah Zam, a dissident pro-reform journalist who had fled to France and was captured by the Iranian military last year. Zam, who was convicted of fomenting violence and unrest during the 2017 anti-government protests in the Islamic Republic, was forced to escape his homeland and seek asylum in France, before being lured into a trap in Iraq in what Iranian officials called a “complex intelligence operation.” The court’s decision drew sharp rebuke from human rights groups and from the Paris government, which called the harsh sentence “a serious attack on freedom of expression and freedom of the press in Iran.” Amnesty International said the ruling was “a shocking escalation in Iran’s use of the death penalty as a weapon of repression.” The 2017 mass demonstrations over Iran’s dire economic situation led to thousands of arrests and 21 dead protesters.