Iran to gouge man's eye in 'eye for an eye' punishment

A doctor plants eyelashes on an ocular prosthesis for a social programme benefiting those unable to afford... — Iran's Supreme Court ordered the removal of an eye of a man accused of blinding another man in a street fight Reuters

Going by the Sharia law that says "eye for an eye", a 28-year-old man in Iran will have his eye gouged out for blinding a man with a metal rod in a street fight. The man claims he did not deliberately blind the victim and that it was only an accident.

The Iranian Supreme Court ordered the sentence against the man, identified as Saman, Oslo-based NGO Iran Human Rights said in a news release citing the Persian-language publication Shahrvand, which is published from Canada. However, it is not clear when the sentence will be carried out. Iran has so far not released any official statement on the case.

"The blinding punishment is part of a retribution sentence issued by the Supreme Court to Saman for allegedly blinding another man during a street fight," the NGO wrote.

Saman was reportedly 23 when he got into a scuffle with Jalal, who was then 25. The scuffle resulted in the latter losing his sight. According to the newspaper report, Saman repeatedly claimed during interrogations that he accidentally blinded Jalal during the brawl.

The accused was reportedly sentenced to the eye-gouging punishment by a court on 1 August 2015, according to a previous report in the Daily Mail.

In March 2015, a similar sentence was ordered in Iran. A man convicted of throwing acid on another man, blinding him and disfiguring him for life, was ordered to be punished with the removal of his eye. The acid attack took place in the city of Qom in 2010.