Iran executed over 500 people so far in 2022, highest in 5 years: Report
Norway-based group Iran Humans Rights (IHR) told news agency AFP that at least 504 people have so far been executed in Iran this year and it was still working to confirm the additional cases of individuals said to have been hanged.
Amid high tension in Iran that has been ongoing for months now over the death of Mahsa Amin for allegedly violating the Islamic country's strict dress code for females, a rights group said Monday that more than 500 people have been executed so far in 2022.
Norway-based group Iran Humans Rights (IHR) told news agency AFP that at least 504 people have so far been executed in Iran this year and it was still working to confirm the additional cases of individuals said to have been hanged.
The development comes amid strong anti-regime protests in the country that erupted in September. Of the 504 people, four were mentioned by official media that said they were executed on Sunday on accusations of working with Israel's intelligence service.
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“These individuals were sentenced to death without due process or a fair trial behind the closed doors of the Revolutionary Court,” IHR director Mahmood Amiry-Moghaddam said in a statement. “Their sentences lacked all legal validity,” AFP reported citing the statement.
He added that the executions were intended to create “societal fear and divert public attention” from the country's “intelligence failures”.
Another of those recently hanged was a woman, who was executed Saturday in Dastgerd in central Iran accused of murdering her father-in-law, the IHR told AFP.
The rights group expressed concern, the AFP report added, over the number of women executed in Iran, often on charges of murdering partners or relatives in abusive relationships.
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The IHR further stated that the number of people executed this year is already the highest in five years. The rights group's data suggested that in 2021, at least 333 people were executed - a 25 per cent rise in comparison to 267 in 2020.
Amnesty International meanwhile put the number of people killed last year at 314 - higher than any nation globally, it said. It, however, said that such data is not available for China, where it believes - the AFP report cited, annual executions run into the thousands.
In reference to death penalties issued over the ongoing protests in Iran, the IHR said that 26 people, including three minors, are currently facing charges that could see them executed.
The IHR report on the number of executions comes close on the heels of Iran abolishing its ‘morality police’. The decision was made in wake of widespread stir in the nation. “Morality police have nothing to do with the judiciary and have been abolished,” Attorney General Mohammad Jafar Montazeri was quoted as saying by the ISNA news agency.
