At least 901 people were executed in Iran last year, including 40 in the same week in December. This was said by United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights Volker Türk on Tuesday. Iran is therefore the country with the highest number of executions in the world in 2024 – China, for which no figures are known, is not included in the count.
In recent years, the number of executions in the country has been growing: in 2023, 853 people were executed, the year before 582. Türk is concerned about the increasing trend and states that “it is high time for Iran to put an end to this wave of executions”. Most of those executed in 2024 were incarcerated for drug-related crimes, according to official figures. But also dissidents and people who were involved the protests against the Iranian government in 2022 and 2023 were executed last year.
Lots of women
2024 is also the year with the highest number of female executions since 2008, when human rights organization Iran Human Rights (IHR) began documenting death sentences in the country. According to IHR, 31 women were sentenced to death last year.
“Many of the women executed for murder were victims of domestic violence or sexual abuse and acted out of desperation,” the organization said. A UN spokesperson said at a press conference, according to Reuters news agency, that one of the executed women had been sentenced to death for killing her husband when he tried to rape her daughter.
Retaliation Act
With 972 executions in one year, 2015 remains the highest number of executions in Iran. In the years that followed, the number fell sharply. But since 2022, when large-scale protests flared up in Iran following the death of a young woman by Iranian moral police, there has been a clear increase in the number of executions.
One explanation for this is the use of the Islamic law of retaliation, also known as ‘gisas’. This law stipulates that a murder must be paid for with another life, unless the victim’s family forgives the perpetrator and agrees to compensation.
„[De doodstraf] is incompatible with the fundamental right to life and poses the unacceptable risk of innocent people being executed,” Türk said in his statement. The UN commissioner is urging Iranian authorities to impose “a moratorium” on the death penalty, meaning the death penalty will still be legal but death sentences will no longer be imposed or carried out. According to the UN, this middle ground is in force in 170 states.