Iran: 12 Executions inside Orumiyeh Central Prison in 11 Days; 9 of These for Drug Offenses

Iran Human Rights
Iran Human 12 prisoners were hanged inside the Orumiyeh Central Prison between October 18 and October 29, 9 of these for drug trafficking crimes, the International Campaign for Human Rights in Iran has learned.

According to a source, on October 18, 2014, 5 inmates sentenced to death on drug-related charges were transferred from the facility's Ward 15 to its Quarantine Ward, and hanged at 11:30 p.m. The 5 inmates, all citizens of Orumiyeh, were Fakhreddin Ghavidel, Esfandiar Ghahremani, Nejat Karimi, Arash Sigari, and Bahram Seddighi.

5 other inmates, Salaheddin Behnam Kerdar, Rashid Alizadeh, Reza Tahmassebi, Younes Golbahar, and Latif Mohammadi, were executed in the same facility on October 26, 2014. All of them, except for Mohammadi, had been sentenced to death on charges of drug trafficking and possession.

According to the United Nations, death sentences may be assigned only in the case of the "most serious" crimes, and drug-related charges do not fulfill this requirement. The vast majority of executions in Iran are carried out for drug-related offenses.

Recently, Iran's top human rights official, Mohammad Javad Larijani, stated in a CNN interview that 80% of the executions in Iran are drug-related and that the "world should appreciate" Iran's war on narcotics. The UN's Special Rapporteur on human rights in Iran, however, stated in his most recent report that "The rise in executions for crimes that do not meet the threshold of 'most serious crimes'...severely contravene[s] the [Iranian] Government's international and national commitments."

Iran has the highest per capita execution rate in the world. According to the UN's Special Rapporteur on Iran, between July 2013 and June 2014, at least 852 individuals were executed.