Two prominent Iranian judges were shot dead in the country's Supreme Court, state media reported.
The judiciary's Mizan news website said that judges Ali Rezini and Muhammad Moqissa were killed after an armed man entered the court in the capital, Tehran, on Saturday morning.
The attacker is said to have then killed himself while fleeing the scene. A bodyguard was reportedly injured in the attack.
The motive for the attack is unclear, but both judges are said to have played a role in the persecution and killing of opponents of the Islamic regime throughout the 1980s and 1990s.
In a statement to the Islamic Republic of Iran News Agency, the Judicial Authority’s Media Office described the attack as a deliberate assassination.
She also said that according to preliminary findings, the attacker was not involved in any case heard by the Supreme Court, and an investigation has been opened to identify and arrest any other people who may have been involved in the attack.
Judiciary spokesman Asghar Jahangir told Iranian state television that the attacker entered the court carrying a gun before opening fire.
One of the judges, Razzini, survived an assassination attempt in 1998.
The other, measured, was imposed by the United States in 2019The Treasury Department accused him of “overseen countless unfair trials in which charges were not proven and evidence was ignored.”
At that time, he was a judge in the Revolutionary Court in Tehran. He was reportedly appointed to the Supreme Court in 2020.
Moqisseh was also among seven Iranian judges sanctioned by Canada in 2023 over what the country called their “role in gross and systematic human rights violations.”
