If you’re ever in Iran, you’d better be really, really careful about imbibing a little beer:
Norwegian-Iranian Mamand Mamandy had a brutal meeting with police after drinking two beers while on holiday in Iran.
“It’s getting better now, but I am still in great pain,” Mamandy, 35, told Aftenposten.no. “My brother is a doctor, and treated me after the whipping. I was in great pain and could not sleep.”Mamandy, a Kurd, explained that he was visiting his mother in Baneh, Iran in April when he was arrested by police.
“We were on an outing with family and friends, six or seven in the evening, and were having a barbecue and enjoying ourselves. Altogether I drank two beers. The police happened to drive by,” Mamandy said.
He said that he was immediately arrested and taken to the police station where he was sentenced to 130 lashes. This sentence, for beer drinking, was carried out publicly according to news agency Iran Focus.
“I received 130 lashes on the back of my body. Police whipped me,” Mamandy said. He came to Norway as an asylum seeker in 1999. He lives in Drammen with his wife and they are awaiting Norwegian citizenship.
Assuming that this story is accurate and that there isn’t something more going on here, this is yet another example of religious fanaticism leading to endangering the lives of those who fall into its clutches. There’s really not much more to say about this. Besides, a picture is worth a thousand words (as they say), and there’s one below the fold of the results:
