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Iranian Regime Launches Terrorist Campaign of Assassinations Against Ahwazi Activists in Exile

By: Abdulrahman Hetteh (Specialist in the Field of International Law and Human Rights)

On Wednesday November 8 2017, Ahmad Mola Nissi, one of the founders of the Arab Struggle Movement for the Liberation of Al-Ahwaz, was shot dead by a masked gunman in front of his house in The Hague, Netherlands. Despite the arrival of emergency services to the location providing CPR and medical attention, Mola died on scene from multiple injuries to his chest and head.

Mola’s family told the media that he had been threatened with death on multiple occasions by the Iranian regime in order prevent him from speaking up for the forgotten people of the occupied Al-Ahwaz region in Iran. Mola, 54, fled Iran with his wife and five children in 2005 due to incessant regime death threats. Despite exile, Mola continued his political activities, and as such, the regime finally decided to assassinate him.

The physical elimination of political dissidents is a tactic carried out by Iranian regime in order to terrorise activists having support and followers among the minority peoples in Iran. It could be argued that the political assassinations of freedom fighters by the regime are carried out, not only to directly harm the activists and their families, but also to instill fear-based control among non-Persian peoples who oppose the regime’s brutal reign.

New agencies The Independent and Reuters have both reported that “Ahwazi Arabs are a minority in mainly ethnic Persian Iran, and some see themselves as under Persian occupation and want independence or autonomy. They say they are deprived of decent living standards and civil rights.” Yousef Azizi Benitorof, an Ahwazi Arab activist, argued that the killing of Ahmad Mola is likely to have been carried out by forces affiliated with the Iranian Intelligence Service. Benitorof believes the fight against autocratic regimes has always been accompanied by such casualties.

It is worth noting that after the 1979 revolution, the Iranian Intelligence Service assassinated more than three hundred of its opponents in Europe. With the start of President Khatami’s era ruling Iran, such assassination missions almost ended. However, the killing of Ahwazi Arab activists has continued to this day.

Inside the occupied Ahwazi region, Arab poets and activists are often killed by poisoning and other suspicious methods. The Iranian regime kills Ahwazi activists abroad in a similar fashion, however, now more direct assassination methods have become more common. Benitorof noted that due to the important geopolitical position of Al-Ahwaz, the Ahwazi National Movement has become increasingly worrisome to the dominance of the Iranian state.

The Azerbaijan National Resistance Organization (ANRO) condemned the assassination of Ahwazi leader Ahmad Mola, and stated that “assassination has long been a standard method of the Iranian regime to silence dissent, especially when dissidents or opposition figures demand political transparency, free speech or human rights for deprived minorities.”

Ahwazi civil and political activists are urging authorities in the Netherlands to make public their latest findings related to the assassination. They are also asking that further protection be provided for Ahwazis in Europe and elsewhere due to this event. It’s imperative that the international community and international human rights organizations take tangible measures to stop any future killings of Ahwazi dissidents by Iranian forces.