Head of state Ayatollah Ali Khamenei regularly issues amnesties. It is often unclear who benefits from them. Activists have criticized the pardons in the past.
Iran’s religious leader Ali Khamenei has pardoned almost 3,000 prisoners. The move was made following a written request from the head of the judiciary, Gholam-Hussein Mohseni-Ejehi, as the Iranian news agency Tasnim reported. The pardons also included reduced sentences and were made on the occasion of the birthdays of the Islamic prophet Mohammed and Shiite scholar Jafar Sadik.
According to the state news agency Irna, the death sentences of 59 convicts were also commuted to prison terms. Of the total of 2,887 amnesties, most convictions came from the general and revolutionary courts. In 1,291 cases, the prisoners are to be released, and 1,596 other prisoners will receive reduced sentences. 40 foreigners were also pardoned.
Head of state Ayatollah Ali Khamenei regularly pardons prisoners, often around Islamic holidays. According to the religious leadership, this is intended to show leniency. After the nationwide protests in autumn 2022, for example, the religious leader pardoned tens of thousands of prisoners. At the time, activists criticized the amnesties as a diversionary tactic from the repressive government course.
On Wednesday, the well-known politician Faeseh Hashemi and daughter of the now deceased former President Ali Akbar Hashemi-Rafsanjani was released early from prison. Hashemi was arrested at the end of September 2022 and sentenced to five years in prison in the wake of the wave of protests. An Austrian imprisoned in Iran was released a few days ago. It remains unclear whether they were also pardoned.
