IRAN HANGS EIGHT CONVICTS

Iran hanged eight men for murder or rape, the Fars news agency reported.
The five murderers and three rapists were hanged in Tehran's notorious Evin prison.
Three other men who were scheduled to be executed -- Mohammad Fadaie, Behnoud Shojaie and Davoud Mahdour -- won a one-month reprieve to reach an agreement with the victims' families, it said.
Fadaie and Shojaie were due to go on the gallows for crimes committed before they reached the age of 18 but Iran's judiciary chief Ayatollah Mahmoud Hashemi Shahroudi ordered a one-month stay of execution for the two.
The hanged men were only identified by their first names:
Kiarash, 32, who was sentenced to death for stabbing to death another man, Nader, in a fight in 2005; Ali Reza, 28, who had beaten up and strangled a man, Ruhollah, in a burglary in the victim's house; Abdolhamid, 34, who had raped a young girl; Ali Akbar was hanged after serving a few years of jail term for the beating to death of a young man in 2005; Mohammad, 27, stabbed to death the 21-year-old Mohammad Hossein in a fight in 2001; The sixth and seven executions were of two cousins both identified as Ali, who together kidnapped and raped a young girl in 2005; Farhad, 31, killed a man in a group fight.