Niusha Boghrati
Worldpress.org correspondent
April 15, 2008

(Photo: C.I.A. World Factbook)

"I am a murderer!" The young voice trembled on the other side of the telephone line. "I was 15 when I committed the murder. I regret what I did. It was an accident. Please save me! I want to live. I want to be free. I am living the last days of my life. Any day now they may take me to the noose. I want to survive. Is there anybody there who can save me?"

The short conversation fades into the distant tumult of Adel Abad Prison in Shiraz, a city in southwest-central Iran, where Behnam Zare' has been awaiting execution for three years.

In the spring of 2005, Behnam was a freshman in high school when a scuffle over pet pigeons broke out between him and his friend Mehrdad. Minutes later, Behnam had become his buddy's murderer. He says he still has no recollection of how it really happened.

Behnam, still a minor at the time he was arrested, landed in prison. Not long after the judicial process began he was convicted of murder in the primary court and sentenced to death.

"We tried hard to reverse the death sentence during the past three years. But all the efforts have so far been in vain," said defense lawyer Mohammad Mostafaei, who advocates Behnam's case. "In spite of every effort we made, the verdict has been approved both by the High Court of the Islamic Republic, and the head of Iran's judiciary."