Iran: You overthrew the Shah because of human rights violations; and now???

Iran has executed an average of almost two people a day in the first six months of this year.
A disturbing video of the public execution of three men in Iran has sparked anger among human rights activists.

The graphic video, released by Amnesty International on Thursday, showed guards standing on top of buses draping ropes around necks of three convicts sentenced to death by hanging after being convicted. The men were later hanged from an overhead bridge after the vehicles drove away.

The executions, which took place on 19 July in the western city of Kermanshah, home to Iran's Kurd minority, attracted significant crowds, including children. Some of the crowds appear to be filming hangings by mobile phones. Many of the people in the crowds are forced to attend and cheer support or risk being ‘listed’ by internal security forces as anarchists. In all cases, family and friends of those hanged must cheer in support. If there is a show of sorrow or anger, then they too make the anarchist list.

The video, which was supplied to Amnesty by an Iranian human rights activist, Fazel Hawramy from kurdishblogger.com, highlights the use of public executions, in which officials publicly hang convicts from a large crane or a high place in front of crowds.

"What is so alarming about this video is the apparent normality of the event. Thousands of people are watching as if it were a football match. People are shouting and cheering. But what is most shocking is the participation of children in this barbaric 'spectacle'," Hawramy said.

The release of the video follows human rights groups' alarm over the sharp escalation in capital punishment in Iran.

WORLD....the victims of these mass executions are murdered twice, the second by the silence and anonymity surrounding their executions, which robbed them of a meaningful and acknowledged death.

These people did in fact exist.  They deserve our oturage!