Germany: The daughter of the Iranian-German who died in Iran does not believe Tehran

The family of Jamshid Sharmahd, an Iranian dissident naturalized German and sentenced to death by the Islamic Republic, “believes nothing” of what Iran says about the circumstances of his death, the subject of contradictory versions, according to his daughter.

Tehran initially claimed that the condemned man had been executed, then declared on Tuesday that he had died last week, even before his execution. “Jamshid Sharmahd was sentenced to death, his execution was imminent, but he died before it could take place,” judiciary spokesperson Asghar Jahangir assured journalists in Tehran.

Iranian consulates closed

“We don’t believe in anything” what the Iranian authorities say, Gazelle Sharmahd told AFP in the evening. “We have never, ever believed the words of a jihadist, terrorist regime,” she added. “We need governments that do their job (…). “We want evidence from an independent investigation outside Iran.”

The announcement on October 28 of the execution of the Iranian-German provoked a diplomatic crisis with Berlin, which recalled its ambassador to Tehran and closed three Iranian consulates on German soil. Iran does not recognize dual nationality for its nationals.

Jamshid Sharmahd, aged 69, was sentenced to death in 2023 for “corruption on earth”, for his alleged involvement in an attack on a mosque in Shiraz (south), which left 14 dead and some 300 injured in April 2008 “Corruption on earth” is the most serious charge in Iran’s penal code and usually carries the death penalty.

“Where is the body?”

“Even if a foreigner had committed crimes in Iran, we would have had the right to handle this case in accordance with the law,” Asghar Jahangir stressed. Jamshid Sharmahd emigrated to Germany in the 1980s and lived in the United States from 2003. He was notably distinguished by hostile statements against the Islamic Republic on satellite channels in Persian.

Iran announced his arrest in 2020 during a “complex operation”, without specifying where, how or when he was arrested. According to his family, Jamshid Sharmahd was kidnapped by Iranian security services during a transit in Dubai, before being forcibly returned to Iran.

“Any cause of the death – if it is proven – of my father, who was in solitary confinement for 1,400 days, amounts to murder,” insisted his daughter. “If there is murder, there is a body so where is the body?”, she insisted, estimating that Germany and the United States are “complicit” in this “murder” and do not should not feel “free from their obligations”.

FBI and CIA

Iranian justice also accused Jamshid Sharmahd of contacts with “FBI and CIA officers” and of having “attempted to contact Israeli Mossad agents”. In recent years, Iran has executed several dual nationals.

The director of Iran Human Rights (IHR), a human rights NGO based in Norway, also called for clarification on this issue. “Given the lack of transparency and the contradictory versions of justice, we are asking for independent investigations by an international delegation, with forensic doctors,” declared Mahmood Amiry-Moghaddam.

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