Amnesty International: Iran Remains Global Leader In Executions

(New York, N.Y.) – This week, Amnesty International released its annual report, Death Sentences and Executions, on the usage of judicial death sentences and executions worldwide from January to December 2020. Within the report, the Islamic Republic of Iran is noted for using the death penalty “as a weapon of political repression against dissidents, protesters and members of ethnic minority groups.” Data on executions shows that Tehran leads the Middle East North Africa (MENA) region in carrying out capital punishment and ranks second worldwide behind China.

United Against Nuclear Iran (UANI)’s resource, Cruel and Inhuman: Executions and Other Punishment in Iran, outlines the facts and figures on the use and abuse of executions and other cruel tactics by Iran’s judicial system. Iran’s judicial system remains among the most brutal in the world. The Iranian regime executes more people per capita than any other country. It carries out more total executions than any nation but China, whose population is over 17 times that of Iran’s. Tehran continues to target political dissidents and ethnic, religious, and sexual minorities for execution. Capital punishment can be—and often is—carried out against juvenile offenders and for nonviolent crimes.

The cruelty and inhumanity of Iran’s judicial system goes well beyond executions, however. Individuals may be arrested and indefinitely detained without charge or on trumped-up offenses; subject to degrading treatment, including torture, in order to extract confessions; denied rights such as access to legal counsel and fair and speedy trial; and sentenced to other barbaric penalties such as amputation, blinding, and flogging. Political prisoners are often sentenced to death and executed on trumped-up, nonpolitical charges, including drug smuggling. Consequently, the true number of political prisoners incarcerated or executed remains unknown.

To read UANI’s resource: Cruel and Inhuman: Executions and Other Punishment in Iran, please click here.

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