THE Netherlands has frozen contacts with Iran after Teheran hanged an Iranian-Dutch woman for drug smuggling on Saturday, having initially arresting her for anti-government protests.
Zahra Bahrami’s execution brings the total number of people hanged in Iran so far this year to 66 – on average more than two a day – according to an AFP tally based on media reports.
‘A drug trafficker named Zahra Bahrami, daughter of Ali, was hanged early on Saturday morning after she was convicted of selling and possessing drugs,’ the Teheran prosecutor’s office said.
Dutch Foreign Minister Uri Rosenthal ‘was profoundly shocked by the news, he called it an act committed by a barbarous regime,’ foreign ministry spokesman Bengt van Loosdrecht told AFP.
‘The Netherlands has decided to freeze all contacts with Iran’ after obtaining confirmation of Bahrami’s execution from Iran’s ambassador to the Netherlands Kazem Gharib Abadi, the ministry spokesman said.
‘This concerns all official contacts between diplomats and civil servants,’ he added. Bahrami, a 46-year-old Iranian-born naturalised Dutch citizen, was reportedly arrested in December 2009 after joining a protest against the government while visiting relatives in the Islamic republic.