Rights groups accuse Iran of fear tactics as surge in capital punishment sparks international concern
Iran executed 834 people last year, the highest number since 2015, as capital punishment surged in the country, two rights groups said yesterday.
The number of executions carried out by hanging was up by about 43 per cent from 2022, said the Norway-based Iran Human Rights and France-based Together Against the Death Penalty.
It was just the second time in two decades that more than 800 executions were recorded in a year, after 972 people were put to death in 2015.
The groups have accused Tehran of using the death penalty to spread fear throughout society, with the country’s authorities having been shaken by widespread protests in response to Mahsa Amini’s death in police custody in September 2022.
“Instilling societal fear is the regime’s only way to hold on to power, and the death penalty is its most important instrument,” said IHR director Mahmood Amiry-Moghaddam.
Iran executed nine men convicted of attacks on security forces during the protests – two
in 2022, six last year and one so far this year, the rights groups said. But executions have increased on other charges, notably in drug-related cases.
“Of particular concern is the dramatic escalation in the number of drug-related executions in 2023, which rose to 471 people, more than 18 times higher than the figures
recorded in 2020,” the groups said.
Members of ethnic minorities, notably the Sunni Baluch from south-eastern Iran, are “grossly over-represented amongst those executed” on drug-related charges, the rights groups said.
A total of 167 members of the Baluch minority were executed last year, constituting 20 per cent of the total executions, despite the ethnic group comprising only about 5 per cent of Iran’s population.
Together Against the Death Penalty director Raphael Chenuil-Hazan said the “lack of reaction” by the UN Office on Drugs and Crime was sending “the wrong signal to the Iranian authorities”.
Most hangings in Iran are carried out inside prisons, but the rights groups said that seven people were hanged in public spaces last year, more than three times the previous year’s figure.
At least 22 women were executed, the highest number in the past decade, the groups said.
Mr Amiry-Moghaddam expressed concern that a lack of international outrage at the executions, in particular with attention focused on the Israel-Gaza war, was only likely to encourage Tehran to carry out more hangings.
“The inconsistency in the international community’s reaction to the executions in Iran is unfortunate, and sends the wrong signal to the authorities,” he said.