Five days after a flogging sentence was carried out in the case of Kurdish union activist Seddigh ‎Amjadi, two more union activists, Fares Goviliyan and Abbas Andariani, also received lashes in ‎a Sanandaj prison. ‎

Flogging sentences were first carried out in the cases of labor activists who had attended last ‎year's May Day rally, and were condemned widely across Iran, especially in the province of ‎Kurdistan. ‎

Nobel Peace Prize winner Shirin Ebadi, vice president of the Syndicate of Workers of Tehran ‎and Suburbs Bus Company Ebrahim Madadi, spokesperson and central committee member of ‎the Dismissed and Unemployed Workers' Union Jafar Azimzadeh, and several prominent human ‎rights organizations and labor unions across the country have condemned the judiciary's flogging ‎sentences, set to be carried out in eight more cases later this year. ‎

Seddigh Amjadi was summoned to the Sanandaj appellate court last week, where he was arrested ‎immediately and transferred to Sanandaj's central prison. His flogging sentence of 10 lashes was ‎carried out on him on the same day. Five days after the flogging of Amjadi, and despite ‎widespread condemnations issued by labor and human rights organizations, two more of the 13 ‎arrested union activists, Fares Goviliyan and Abbas Andariani, received 10 lashes each. ‎

According to the latest reports, eight more union activists in Sanandaj are awaiting their flogging ‎sentences. Several union members have told the judiciary, "We all want to receive lashes," in a ‎symbolic act of solidarity with their flogged colleagues. ‎

History

Last spring, the Dismissed and Unemployed Workers' Union announced that it will hold a May ‎Day rally in Sanandaj to publicize the plight of workers struggling to achieve higher living ‎standards. The union's officials also announced that government security forces are not opposed ‎to holding such a gathering. ‎

However, on the day of the gathering, police and security officers arrested thirteen participants, ‎all of which were released after a few days in light of widespread condemnations issued by labor ‎and human rights organizations. The thirteen participants were later summoned to the ‎revolutionary court and put on trial on charges of "disrupting public order" by attending the May ‎Day rally. ‎

Following the trial, two of the thirteen participants were sentenced to two and a half years ‎imprisonment, and the remaining eleven were sentenced to 10 lashes and 91 days imprisonment. ‎Last week, the Kurdistan appellate court finalized the flogging sentences of all eleven activists. ‎