Iran: Regime hangs 18 people over the weekend

The National Council of Resistance of Iran (NCRI) have reported that the Iranian regime has hanged 18 people over the weekend. Two of these were carried out in public and one was a woman hanged on Sunday.

In an en masse hanging in Qezelhesar Prison in Karaj, north-west of Tehran, eleven people were killed on Sunday. One of them was a woman and two others were identified as Saeed Saberi and Moslem Bahrami.

The state-run Tasnim news agency reported that in Karaj on Sunday, two men were hanged in public in the square in the city’s Mehshahr District. They were identified only by their initials: Q. J. and M. R.

In the city of Birjand, eastern Iran, on Sunday, another three hanging took place in prison. The victims were identified as Mansour Zafarani, Yousef Barahoui and Qassem Delshad who were accused of drugs-related charges.

In Lakan Prison in Rasht, northern Iran two prisoners were hanged on Saturday. Their names were not provided but they are said to have been 40 and 49 years old. They too were accused of drugs-related crimes.

The NCRI report that on 11th July five men were hanged in the Central Prison of Arak, central Iran. They were identified as Masoud Taqi-Pour, Hassan Faraj-Pour, Mehdi Baqeri, Baqer Jalili and Hamid Haqvin – also accused of drugs-related offences.

On 13th July, nine prisoners were hanged collectively on in Gohardasht Prison in Karaj. Three of them were named as Seyyed Mohammad Taheri, Amir Khadem Rezaiyan and Saeid Ahmadi.

In their article, the NCRI highlighted that over “270 Members of the European Parliament signed a joint statement on Iran last month, calling on the European Union to ‘condition’ its relations with Tehran to an improvement of human rights”.

They state that the MEPs from “all the EU Member States and from all political groups in the Parliament said they are concerned about the rising number of executions in Iran after Hassan Rouhani took office as President three years ago”.

In their 6th April annual report on the death penalty during the year 2015, Amnesty International claimed that a minimum of 977 people were executed in the country, compared to at least 743 the previous year. They also highlighted that “Iran alone accounted for 82% of all executions recorded” in the Middle East and North Africa.

During Hassan Rouhani’s time as president, more than 2,500 executions have taken place. In March, the United Nations Special Rapporteur on the human rights situation in Iran announced that the number of executions in Iran in 2015 was greater than any other year in the last 25 years. 

The NCRI remind that Rouhani has “explicitly endorsed” the executions as examples of ‘God’s commandments’ and ‘laws of the parliament that belong to the people’.