The United States is concerned over the number of executions taking place in Iran and the faulty judicial process that leads up to them.
State Department Spokesperson Matthew Miller voiced that concern after a group of United Nations experts reported a sharp rise in executions during the month of August. In a statement released by the UN Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights, the OHCHR, the experts called on the Iranian government to “immediately stop” conducting executions.
Spokesperson Miller said, “We do remain concerned about the number of executions in Iran and most importantly how those executions are carried out. That’s the end of a judicial process that can in no way be described as providing fair trials. It can no way be described as independent.”
The UN experts said that according to the information they received, of the 93 executions that took place in Iran during August, nearly half were carried out for drug offences. “Executions for drug offences violate international standards,” the experts said. Additionally, they noted, “Reports of serious violations of fair trial and due process rights mean that the death penalty as it is currently practiced in the Islamic Republic of Iran amounts to unlawful execution.”
Drug crimes are not the only crimes in Iran that can result in execution. The perpetrators of so-called security crimes, including “spreading corruption on earth” and “waging war on God,” are also subject to the ultimate penalty. These vague charges, as the OHCHR points out, have been leveled against anti-government dissidents also “in clear violation of international standards.”
One such dissident, the UN notes, was Reza Rasaei, a Kurdish Iranian of the Yarsani faith, who was arrested for his participation in the massive “Woman, Life, Freedom” protests following the 2022 death in police custody of Mahsa Amini. Rasaei was executed on August 6. T;;he U.S. Office of the Special Envoy for Iran “strongly” condemned Resaei’s execution and posted on the social platform X: “Tehran’s continued use of the death penalty against Woman, Life, Freedom protesters – following sham trials and forced confessions - is reprehensible.”
State Department Spokesperson Miller said the way Iran carries out executions is “one of a number of violations of human rights that we see Iran continue to take, and it’s why we continue to enforce our sanctions to hold Iran accountable for those actions.”
