Pompeo announces US sanctions on Iran judges, prisons after Navid Afkari execution

The United States on Thursday blacklisted several Iranian officials and entities over alleged gross violations of human rights, including slapping sanctions on a judge it said was involved in the case of an Iranian wrestler sentenced to death.

Secretary of State Mike Pompeo in a statement said the United States imposed sanctions on Judge Seyyed Mahmoud Sadati, Judge Mohammad Soltani, Branch 1 of the Revolutionary Court of Shiraz, and Adel Abad, Orumiyeh, and Vakilabad Prisons.

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Earlier Thursday, US Special Representative for Iran and Venezuela Elliott Abrams told a hearing at the Senate Foreign Relations Committee that Washington was committed to holding accountable those who deny freedom and justice to people of Iran.”

Navid Afkari was executed earlier this month after being convicted of stabbing a security guard to death during anti-government protests in 2018, Iranian state media reported, in a case that has sparked international outcry.

Iran’s Supreme Court rejected a review of the case in late August.

Afkari’s case had sparked an outcry from Iranians on social media and from international human rights groups. US President Donald Trump also called on Iran this month not to execute the wrestler.

The athlete’s family has maintained that his conviction depended on a confession that was extracted through torture, which Afkari later recanted.

The US also imposed new sanctions on Iran’s defense ministry and others involved in its nuclear and weapons program to support the US assertion that all UN sanctions against Tehran are now restored, which key European allies as well as Russia and China reject.

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