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Mahmoud Asgari ((ペルシア語:محمود عسگري)), aged 16, and Ayaz Marhoni ((ペルシア語:عياض مرهوني)), aged 18, were Iranian teenagers from the province of Khorasan who were publicly hanged in Edalat (Justice) Square in Mashhad, northeast Iran, on July 19, 2005. They were executed after being convicted by the court of having raped a 13-year-old boy.〔http://www.thenation.com/article/witnesses-execution/〕 The case attracted international media attention. The British lesbian, gay and bisexual group OutRage!,〔http://www.petertatchell.net/lgbt_rights/outing/defence.htm〕 alleged that the teenagers were executed for consensual homosexual acts and not rape. In addition to Human Rights Watch, Paula Ettelbrick, the executive director of the International Gay & Lesbian Human Rights Commission, has said "It was not a gay case.".〔http://www.washingtonblade.com/2005/7-29/news/worldnews/iran.cfm〕 Ettelbrick has also criticized OutRage! for its past hateful rhetoric toward Muslims.〔 Human Rights Watch condemned the executions of the juveniles but also stated "There is no evidence that this was a consensual act," and observed that "The bulk of evidence suggests that the youths were tried on allegations of raping a 13-year-old, with the suggestion that they were tried for consensual homosexual conduct seemingly based almost entirely on mistranslations and on cursory news reporting magnified by the Western press."〔"Response to Peter Tatchell's 'Open Letter'", distributed on e-mail by Scott Long, Human Rights Watch, July 18, 2006.〕 It also stated that it was "deeply disturbed by the apparent indifference of many people to the alleged rape of a 13-year old."〔 The U.S. progressive periodical ''The Nation'' published a lengthy investigation of the story. It criticized the role of Peter Tatchell and OutRage! in spreading the belief the executed youths were gay before it had examined the evidence. The article concluded that, given Tatchell's "recent statements, it seems likely that his ideological disposition caused him to look past or dismiss information that cast doubt on the "gay teenagers" story." But it also accepted the possibility that Marhoni and Asgari were hanged simply for engaging in consensual homosexual sex.〔 ==Background== Shari'a (Islamic Law) prescribes the death penalty for homosexual acts even though homosexuality is not referenced in the Quran,〔quran.com/ 〕 but the Convention on the Rights of the Child, of which Iran is a signatory, forbids the execution of juveniles. According to Asgari's lawyer, Rohollah Razaz Zadeh, "death sentences handed to children by Iranian courts are supposed to be commuted to five years in jail", but the Supreme Court in Tehran upheld the death sentence. The ages of the boys remain unclear, with some sources claiming they were fourteen and sixteen at the time of their arrests and sixteen and eighteen when executed. On July 19, 2005, the Iranian Students' News Agency (ISNA) posted an article in Persian describing the execution of the two youths. Its headline stated that they had been executed for "''lavat beh onf''", which means "sodomy/homosexual sex by force" and is a legal term used for rape of men by men.〔 Earlier on the morning of the executions, ''Quds'', the local daily newspaper in Mashhad, published a report on the executions. It gave a detailed account of how the two had raped a 13-year-old boy, and included statements by the father of the rape victim.〔 The ISNA article became the center of the dispute. The gay-rights group, OutRage!, led by Peter Tatchell, published its own free translation of the article on July 21.〔Cited in Ireland, D. (2005) ("Iran Executes 2 Gay Teenagers" ), retrieved August 1, 2005.〕 Two news sources heavily involved in Iranian exile politics had meanwhile contributed to the spread of the story in English. On July 20, 2005, an Iranian opposition group, the National Council of Resistance, the political wing of the People's Mojahedin (also known as the Mojahedin Khalq Organization or MKO), released a press release about the executions. It stated that: "The victims were charged with disrupting public order among other things." It did not mention the charges of rape. Iran Focus, a news website that is widely regarded as an affiliate of the People's Mojahedin, also published an article about the hangings, mentioning no charges at all.〔 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「Mahmoud Asgari and Ayaz Marhoni」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
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