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Biden Fails a Death Penalty Abolitionist’s Most Important Test

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The mystery of Joe Biden’s views about capital punishment has finally been solved. His decision to grant clemency to 37 of the 40 people on federal death row shows the depth of his opposition to the death penalty. And his decision to leave three of America’s most notorious killers to be executed by a future administration shows the limits of his abolitionist commitment. The three men excluded from Biden’s mass clemency—Dylann Roof, Dzhokhar Tsarnaev, and Robert Bowers—would no doubt pose a severe test of anyone’s resolve to end the death penalty. Biden failed that test.
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Germany will close all Iranian consulates in response to the execution of its citizen

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In Germany, all three consulates general of Iran will be closed in response to the execution of the German-Iranian citizen Jamshid Sharmakhd

This was reported by German Foreign Minister Annalena Baerbock, Tagesschau reports.

Iranian consulates will be closed in Frankfurt, Munich and Hamburg. The Iranian embassy in Berlin will continue to work. Those of the 32 consulate employees who do not have German citizenship will have to leave Germany.

Earlier, Germany repeatedly told Iran that the execution of Sharmakhd would have "serious consequences". Baerbock said she would also push for the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps to be added to the European Unionʼs terrorist list. German Chancellor Olaf Scholz also "in the strongest possible terms" condemned Sharmakhdʼs execution, calling it a "scandal."

Execution of Jamshid Sharmahd


Jamshid Sharmahd held dual citizenship of Germany and Iran, as well as a US residency permit. Sharmahd, 69, was living in California before the abduction, believed to have taken place in Dubai, and subsequent detention in Iran.

In 2023, Sharmahd was sentenced to death after being convicted by Iranʼs Islamic Revolutionary Court of involvement in the 2008 Shiraz mosque bombing that killed 14 people

The official verdict was presented in less clear wording and used the term "spreading corruption on Earth*". Iran also accused him of contacting "officers of the US Federal Intelligence Bureau and the US Central Intelligence Agency" and of "attempting to contact Israeli Mossad agents."

Tehran accused the Iranian-German citizen of being "the leader of the Tondar terrorist organization, which directed armed and terrorist activities in Iran from America." The Tondar Organization is the armed wing of the "Assembly of the Kingdom of Iran" based in California (USA) and claims to seek to restore the Iranian monarchy that was overthrown in the 1979 Islamic Revolution.

Germany, the European Union and other countries have called for the death penalty to be abolished. Human rights organizations pointed to the injustice of Sharmahdʼs trial.

* "Mofsed-e-filartz" is the name of crimes punishable by death. This crime is also called "spreading corruption", "corruption that threatens social and political well-being". Iran uses this term for crimes often related to religious values.

Source: babel.ua, Staff, October 31, 2024

_____________________________________________________________________








"One is absolutely sickened, not by the crimes that the wicked have committed,
but by the punishments that the good have inflicted."

— Oscar Wilde



Location: Iran
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