‘Last Breath’: The campaign giving Iran’s condemned a face and a name

A new campaign called 'Last Breath' is spreading among Iranian opposition activists, aiming to put names and faces to the hundreds of people facing execution in Iran. The campaign focuses on individual stories, such as those of kickboxer Benyamin Naghdi and 20-year-old Taraneh Rahimi, to mobilize international pressure. This year, over 950 people have been executed in Iran, including at least 29 arrested in connection with January's protests. The campaign has expanded beyond Persian into English, French, and German, using sunrise imagery to contrast hope with the Islamic Republic's dawn executions.

A new campaign called 'Last Breath' (akharin nafas in Persian) is spreading among Iranian opposition activists on social media, aiming to put names and faces to the hundreds of people facing execution in Iran. The campaign's premise is straightforward: take the name and photograph of somebody facing execution, tell their story, and push it as widely as possible among politicians, journalists, human rights organizations, and the wider public. This year, more than 950 people have been executed in Iran, including at least 29 people arrested in connection with January's protests. Months later, scores of those detained remain at risk of execution. The campaign has already moved beyond Persian, with posts appearing in English, French, and German. One of the central images of the campaign is that of sunrise, contrasting hope with the Islamic Republic's practice of carrying out executions at dawn. Among the prominent cases highlighted are Benyamin Naghdi, a 26-year-old kickboxer sentenced to death after his arrest during the January protests in Shiraz, and Taraneh Rahimi, a 20-year-old woman sentenced to death following her arrest after the January protests in Isfahan. The campaign's strength lies in its simplicity, making the victims difficult to ignore by focusing on individual life stories rather than statistics.