Iran
Death penalty and prisoners' rights · Archive since 1999
Data card
- Legal status
- Retentionist
- Executions recorded in 2026
- 869
- Executions recorded in 2025
- 2,156
- First news item in the archive
- JANUARY 1, 1999 · The 1999 figures for capital sentences and executions...
- News items in the archive
- 9,218
Source: Hands Off Cain database, updated to 2026.
Iran is classified as Retentionist in the Hands Off Cain database, updated to 2026. In 2026 the association recorded 869 executions in the country, against 2,156 the year before. The archive holds 9,218 news items on Iran, from 1999 to today.
Iran is one of the countries where the association records the highest number of executions each year. The usual method is hanging, and capital punishment applies to a wide list of offences: murder, drug offences, offences against state security, sexual offences, and charges such as moharebeh, enmity against God, which allow very broad application.
Many executions are never announced. They emerge from local sources, from human rights organisations and from families. For Iran, more than anywhere else, the archive's count is a documented minimum.
Latest news
- APRIL 16, 2001IranDEATH PENALTY
Five drug-traffickers, sentenced to death by a revolution...
Five drug-traffickers, sentenced to death by a revolution court were hanged in public in the northeastern city of Birjand
- APRIL 5, 2001IranDEATH PENALTY
The death sentences issued to four men who tried in...
The death sentences issued to four men who tried in 1998 to sell Dh4 million worth of hashish to an undercover policeman have been upheld by the Dubai Court of Cassation
- MARCH 19, 2001IranDEATH PENALTY
Five people, included a woman, involved in a "ring...
Five people, included a woman, involved in a "ring of drug-traffickers" in Tehran's Khak-e Sefid District, were executed in public after being sentenced to death the day before by Branch 27 of Tehran's Islamic Revolution Court
- MARCH 8, 2001IranDEATH PENALTY
Mohammad Javad Reza'i, Asghar Ramazani and Ahmad Baqerian,...
Mohammad Javad Reza'i, Asghar Ramazani and Ahmad Baqerian, sentenced to death in the central city of Shahin-Shahr on charges of "kidnapping, rape and aiding and abetting murder", won a last-minute reprieve after they asked for pardon at the gallows
- MARCH 2, 2001IranDEATH PENALTY
The annual report of the American State Department...
The annual report of the American State Department described the death sentences given to smugglers as being tantamount to human rights' violations in Iran
- MARCH 1, 2001IranDEATH PENALTY
Mohammed Reza-Chupari and Daryush Keshavarz , both...
Mohammed Reza-Chupari and Daryush Keshavarz , both Iranians, were hunged in public for murdering three police officers and drug trafficking in the central city of Abadeh
- FEBRUARY 25, 2001IranDEATH PENALTY
Three [unidentified] Afghan bandits were hung in public...
Three [unidentified] Afghan bandits were hung in public in the Khorasan Province on the border with Afghanistan
- FEBRUARY 20, 2001IranDEATH PENALTY
An Afghan national, Shalif Alizehi, was executed after...
An Afghan national, Shalif Alizehi, was executed after being found guilty of robbery, rape and drug trafficking
- FEBRUARY 20, 2001IranDEATH PENALTY
The head of Iran's judiciary, Ayatollah Mahmud Hashemi-Shahrudi,...
The head of Iran's judiciary, Ayatollah Mahmud Hashemi-Shahrudi, defended the use of the death penalty to the visiting UN Human Rights High Commissioner Mary Robinson saying most death sentences passed in Iran were drug-related
- FEBRUARY 18, 2001IranDEATH PENALTY
57 people have been condemned to death in Iran since...
57 people have been condemned to death in Iran since the beginning of the year, according to the National Council for Resistance in Iran (NCRI)
- FEBRUARY 17, 2001IranDEATH PENALTY
Mohammad Ali Qahremani, 45, was publicly executed by...
Mohammad Ali Qahremani, 45, was publicly executed by hanging in Damavand, northwestern Tehran
- FEBRUARY 12, 2001IranDEATH PENALTY
The Islamic Revolution Guards Corps (IRGC) in a statement...
The Islamic Revolution Guards Corps (IRGC) in a statement said the death sentence issued by the late Imam Khomeyni against the apostate Indian-born British writer Salman Rushdie was irrevocable
- FEBRUARY 6, 2001IranDEATH PENALTY
The Iranian opposition said that the Tehran regime...
The Iranian opposition said that the Tehran regime has issued 34 death sentences since the beginning of the current year
- JANUARY 30, 2001IranDEATH PENALTY
Naser Zarafshan, lawyer for the families of the nationalists...
Naser Zarafshan, lawyer for the families of the nationalists Dariush and Parvaneh Foruhar and spokesman for the writer Mohammad Puyandeh, stated that "The relatives oppose the death sentence because they do not seek revenge
- JANUARY 27, 2001IranDEATH PENALTY
Judge Mohammad Reza Aqiqi of the Tehran military court...
Judge Mohammad Reza Aqiqi of the Tehran military court gave death penalty to Ali Roshani, Mahamoud Jafarzadeh and Ali Mohseni three former government agents for the murder of two elderly nationalists, Darioush and his wife Parvaneh Forouhar, and two write
- JANUARY 17, 2001IranDEATH PENALTY
Six of 11 people due to be hanged simultaneously in...
Six of 11 people due to be hanged simultaneously in Iran were executed, state radio reported
- JANUARY 17, 2001IranDEATH PENALTY
IRAN
Six of 11 people due to be hanged simultaneously in Iran were executed, state radio reported.
- JANUARY 16, 2001IranDEATH PENALTY
Supreme court has upheld a death sentence by public...
Supreme court has upheld a death sentence by public stoning for a woman convicted of murdering her husband with the help of her lover
- JANUARY 10, 2001IranDEATH PENALTY
Hamid Heydari, a convicted murderer was hanged in public...
Hamid Heydari, a convicted murderer was hanged in public in Tehran
- JANUARY 10, 2001IranDEATH PENALTY
Iran's Judiciary Chief Mahmud Hashemi-Shahrudi calling...
Iran's Judiciary Chief Mahmud Hashemi-Shahrudi calling for merciless and powerful action against drug-trafficking which has paralysed Iran said that currently 800 drug inmates have been sentenced to death
- JANUARY 7, 2001IranDEATH PENALTY
Hassan Faylom, 39, was hanged in public outside Tehran's...
Hassan Faylom, 39, was hanged in public outside Tehran's Qasr prison, for killing his wife, Fatemeh, 24, and his 19-month old daughter, Melika, stabbing them 41 times "in order to satisfy his lust and that of his lover Mojgan"
- JANUARY 1, 2001IranDEATH PENALTY
Stoning is a pre-Islamic punishment
Stoning is a pre-Islamic punishment
- JANUARY 1, 2001IranDEATH PENALTY
Plotting to overthrow the Islamic regime is subjected...
Plotting to overthrow the Islamic regime is subjected to death sentence under Iran's Islamic penal code
- JANUARY 1, 2001IranDEATH PENALTY
Since 1991 Iran has executed around 5,000 drug pushers
Since 1991 Iran has executed around 5,000 drug pushers
- JANUARY 1, 2001IranDEATH PENALTY
Secretary of the Islamic Human Rights Committee Hasan...
Secretary of the Islamic Human Rights Committee Hasan Zia'ifar dismissed complaints lodged against a report , published on 17 October 2000, by the special representative of the UN Commission on Human Rights Maurice Copithorne to the effect that executions
- JANUARY 1, 2001IranDEATH PENALTY
Iranian law imposes the death penalty for possession...
Iranian law imposes the death penalty for possession of more than 30 grams of heroin or five kilos (11 pounds) of opium
- JANUARY 1, 2001IranDEATH PENALTY
Citizens continued to be tried and sentenced to death...
Citizens continued to be tried and sentenced to death in the absence of sufficient procedural safeguards
- JANUARY 1, 2001IranDEATH PENALTY
At least 250 cases of whippings were carried out in...
At least 250 cases of whippings were carried out in Iran in 2001, according to Amnesty International
- DECEMBER 7, 2000IranDEATH PENALTY
In their Iran Report 2001, Human Rights Watch stated...
In their Iran Report 2001, Human Rights Watch stated "The (Iranian) government continued to make frequent use of the death penalty after trials which failed to comply with international standards
- DECEMBER 4, 2000IranDEATH PENALTY
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