Iran has hanged a Swedish-Iranian man, Habib Chaab, who was sentenced to death for carrying out a lethal attack on a military parade in 2018. However, Tobias Billstrom, Sweden’s Foreign Minister, said that his country’s government has pleaded with Iran not to hang him.
“The death penalty is an inhuman and irreversible punishment and Sweden, together with the rest of the EU, condemns its application under all circumstances,” he said.
The judiciary in Iran charged Chaab of controlling Harakat al-Nidal, the Arab Struggle Movement for the Liberation of Ahvaz, which the country has blamed for attacks in its south-west part.
Arab minority is a significant demography in Iran which has claims of marginalisation and biases that is denied by Iran.
Habib Farajollah Chaab was a creator of a separatist group who demanded freedom for citizens of Arabic origin in the country’s south-western Khuzestan province. Before he was taken by Iranian agents in 2020, he had been living in Sweden for a decade.
According to reports, Chaab was persuaded to travel to Istanbul to see a woman before being abducted and smuggled into Iran. This operation is claimed to have been planned by a known Iranian criminal boss with ties to Turkey.
There are no details regarding Chaab’s detention, however, once he entered Iran, he appeared to confess involvement in the 2018 attack on official TV. He was found guilty of the capital charge of being “corrupt on earth”.
The prosecution claims that Chaab had been involved in attacks since 2005, “under the protection of two spy services, including the Mossad and Sapo,” which are the respective intelligence agencies of Israel and Sweden.
They asserted that Saudi Arabia provided the group with financial and logistical support, and that additional group leaders were headquartered in Denmark, the Netherlands, and Sweden.
