The New York Times, March 15, 2010 – Iranian authorities announced death penalties on Monday for six people arrested during protests in December, in what appeared to be strong warning to the opposition ahead of a traditional annual celebration.
The annual tradition, the Feast of Fire, goes backs thousands of years to Zoroastrian times and has been banned in Iran in recent decades because of its un-Islamic roots. The opposition had called for its celebration this year as a sign of protest.
The supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, issued a decree saying the feast “has no religious basis and is harmful and must be avoided,” the government Web site dolat.ir reported.
The celebration includes jumping over fire in the evening, followed by the Iranian version of Trick-or-Treat, during which young people cover themselves head-to-toe in a chador and bang spoons in pots as they knock on neighbors’ doors for candy.
Two men who also received death sentences for their part in the December protests were executed last month, just ahead of another holiday, the 31st anniversary of the Islamic revolution.
Since a disputed presidential election set off enduring protests last June, the opposition has timed some of its protests to holidays. The December protests came curing Ashura, the commemoration of the martyrdom of Ali, grandson of the Prophet Muhammad. In another gesture timed to intimidate the opposition, a crowd of about 50 people chanted and threw red and green paint on Sunday at the Tehran apartment building of an opposition leader, Mehdi Karroubi, according to an interview posted on Sahamnews, Mr. Karroubi’s Web site.
It was the second time that pro-government forces protested at the home of Mr. Karroubi, an outspoken government critic and one of the candidates in the disputed presidential elections in June that set off the enduring protests.
Mrs. Karroubi said in the interview that a group of officials forced their way into the common areas of their apartment building two weeks ago to “probably install equipment.”
Their son, Ali Karroubi, was arrested briefly on Feb. 11, ahead of the anniversary, and has said he was tortured.
The Feast of Fire precedes the Iranian New Year, which falls on March 21 this year. As is traditional, some prisoners are being released ahead of that holiday. One was Kian Tajbakhsh, an Iranian American scholar who was in Iran working on a book when he was arrested after the June protests, convicted of spying and given a 15-year sentence after the June protests, which was reduced to five on appeal. He was released “temporarily” on Friday on $800,000 bail, said a family member who spoke on condition of anonymity.