IRAN: HRW CALLS FOR GLOBAL END TO JUVENILE EXECUTIONS

Human Rights Watch (HRW) released a report calling on Iran, Saudi Arabia, Sudan, Pakistan, and Yemen to join in a global moratorium on the death penalty for juveniles. The report states that the five countries are the last in the world known to engage in the practice, with a combined 32 executions of juvenile offenders since 2005. HRW said that Saudi Arabia and Iran, which alone has carried out 26 of those 32 juvenile executions, have not implemented legislation prohibiting the practice, while Sudan, Pakistan, and Yemen do not enforce their national bans. Noting that over 100 juvenile offenders are currently on death row or awaiting final verdicts within the five named countries, HRW recommended that Governments in states that have yet to prohibit the juvenile death penalty for all crimes should urgently enact legislation banning the imposition of capital punishment for juveniles, immediately implement a moratorium on all executions of juveniles and review all existing death sentences passed on persons who were under 18 at the time of the crime, and immediately commute those sentences to custodial or other sentences in conformity with international juvenile justice standards.