‘Butcher of Tehran’ elected with 62% of vote in election with 48% turnout. Amnesty International: ‘He should be on trial for crimes against humanity.’
Ebrahim Raisi has been elected as the next president of Iran.
Raisi, a hard-line cleric, was a member of the 1988 ‘death committees,’ which were responsible for the extrajudicial executions of thousands of people, and has been called the ‘butcher of Tehran.’
Raisi received 62% of the vote. However, voter turnout was just 48% a historic low for a presidential election in Iran.
The new president is expected to take a hard-line stance on foreign policy issues such as Iran’s nuclear program, stances more in line with Iranian Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei.
Israeli Foreign Minister Yair Lapid condemned the results of the election. “Iran’s new president, known as the Butcher of Tehran, is an extremist responsible for the deaths of thousands of Iranians. He is committed to the regime’s nuclear ambitions and to its campaign of global terror,” Lapid wrote.
Amnesty International stated that Raisi should be on trial instead of in elected office.
“That Ebrahim Raisi has risen to the presidency instead of being investigated for the crimes against humanity of murder, enforced disappearance and torture, is a grim reminder that impunity reigns supreme in Iran,” said Amnesty Secretary General Agnès Callamard.
(Arutz 7).
