Iran executed 354 people in first half of 2023, rights group reports

Iran has reportedly executed at least 354 people in the first six months of 2023, in a fierce spike in executions carried out by the country’s authorities in comparison to figures from the same period last year.

According to the Norway-based group, Iran Human Rights (IHR), the hanging of 354 people by Tehran during the past six months up to 30 June marks a 36 per cent increase from the 261 people executed in the first six months of 2022.

Of this year’s number, 206 of them were executed for drug-related charges – a statistic which is itself a 126 per cent rise. There is also a racial aspect, according to the IHR, with the Iranian government reported to have disproportionately targeted non-Persian ethnic groups. Chief among those discriminatory cases were the Sunni Baluch minority, which accounted for 20 per cent of all the past six months’ executions.

READ: Iran executed 582 people in 2022, in 75% increase from previous year

Rather than executing the convicts based on an actual rise in the purported crimes, IHR Director, Mahmood Amiry-Moghaddam, stated Iran’s imposition of the death penalty “is used to create societal fear and prevent more protests”. He asserted that the “majority of those killed are low-cost victims of the killing machine, drug defendants who are from the most marginalised communities.”

In recent months, there have emerged significant concerns that the sharp rise in executions carried out by Iranian authorities are a direct result of anti-government protests that swept throughout the country since September last year, after police were blamed for the death of a 22-year-old woman named Mahsa Amini under their custody.

Since the wave of arrests and detentions of protestors took place following a heavy crackdown by the government and security services, many of them have reportedly been slammed with non-political charges in a bid to reduce the chances of Iranian authorities being accused of political suppression.

Only seven men are recorded to have been executed directly in relation to the recent protests, with seven more reportedly at imminent risk of the same sentence.

READ: Egypt, Saudi, Iran account for 90% of global executions, says Amnesty