Iran executed 975 people in 2024 in ‘horrifying escalation’ of death penalty, damning report says

At least 31 women and one child among those executed

by Alisha Rahaman Sarkar

Iran executed as many as 975 people last year in a “horrifying escalation” of the use of the death penalty, human rights groups claimed on Thursday.

A report released by Norway-based Iran Human Rights and France-based Together Against the Death Penalty said the number of executions was 17 per cent more than in 2023 and the highest in over a decade. There were at least 31 women and one child among those sent to the gallows for murder, rape and mostly drug charges last year, the report claimed.

The executed prisoners included protesters, Kurdish dissenters and foreigners, including 80 Afghan nationals.

Here are the report’s key highlights:

• At least 975 people were executed in 2024, a 17 per cent increase compared to 834 in 2023. Only 95 executions, or less than 10 per cent, were officially announced.

• At least 419 executions, or about 43 per cent, were for murder charges.

• At least 503 people, or 52 per cent, were executed for drug-related crimes.

• At least one child offender was among those executed and three other possible cases were still being investigated.

• At least 31 women were executed, the highest number in at least 17 years.

• At least two protesters were executed for murder related charges.

• At least 31 people, amongst them nine Kurdish political prisoners, and a political dissident abducted from a neighbouring country were executed for security-related charges.

• At least 649 prisoners sentenced to death for murder charges were forgiven by the families of the murder victims as per qisas laws.

• At least 80 Afghan nationals were executed in 2024 compared to 25 in 2023 and 16 in 2022.

• At least 5 of those executed suffered from psychosocial and intellectual disabilities.

• At least 534 executions in 2024 and more than 5,075 executions since 2010 were based on death sentences issued by the Revolutionary Courts.

The data "reveals a horrifying escalation in the use of the death penalty by the Islamic Republic in 2024", the report said as the rights groups accused Tehran of using the death penalty as a "central tool of political oppression".

"These executions are part of the Islamic Republic's war against its own people to maintain its grip on power," Iran Human Rights director Mahmood Amiry-Moghaddam said in a statement. "Five people were executed on average every single day in the last three months of the year as the threat of war between Iran and Israel escalated."

According to the report, the Iranian government officially announced only 95 executions, a significant decline from 2023 when nearly 15 per cent of the executions were disclosed.

"Despite repeated calls from the international community, this deliberate lack of transparency not only undermines accountability but also conceals the true scale of the state’s use of the death penalty," the report said.

The report came about a month after the UN human rights chief said Iran had executed 901 prisoners in 2024.

Volker Turk said it was "deeply disturbing that yet again we see an increase in the number of people subjected to the death penalty in Iran year-on-year”. "It is high time Iran stemmed this ever-swelling tide of executions,” he said.

Mr Turk urged Iranian authorities to halt further executions and place a moratorium on the use of capital punishment to eventually abolish the practice.

"The death penalty is incompatible with the fundamental right to life and raises the unacceptable risk of executing innocent people,” he said. “And, to be clear, it can never be imposed for conduct that is protected under international human rights law.”