Iran | At Least 217 Executions in October; One Execution Every 3 Hours

Iran Human Rights (IHRNGO); November 7, 2025: At least 217 people were executed in October 2025, including six women, 11 Afghan nationals, 11 Arabs, eight Baluch and 8 Kurdish minorities. This figure is double that of the 84 executions recorded in September 2024. This is the highest monthly execution figure recorded in at least 25 years.

In the first ten months of 2025, at least 1,271 people have been executed.

Iran Human Rights calls on the international community to use its diplomatic leverage to stop the Islamic Republic’s execution machine and to warn officials that their commission of crimes against humanity will be seriously investigated.

Mahmood Amiry-Moghaddam, IHRNGO’s director, said: “We are witnessing the mass and systematic killing of people whom the Islamic Republic’s judiciary has sentenced to death without fair trials. The international community and governments that have diplomatic relations with Iran are obliged to make halting the Islamic Republic’s execution machinery an immediate priority.”

October 2025 Executions at a Glance:

At least 217 people were executed in October 2025
Only 24 of the executions (11%) were reported by official sources
104 people (48%) were sentenced to qisas (retribution-in-kind) for murder
99 people (45%) were on death row for drug-related offences
6 Arab political prisoners were executed on charges of baghy (armed rebellion), one Kurdish prisoner on charges of moharebeh through association with Salafi groups, one on the charge of "espionage for Israel" and 3 on charges of moharebeh (enmity against god) through armed robbery
3 men were executed for rape charges
6 women were executed; 3 for drug-related offences and 3 for murder charges
11 Arabs, 8 Baluch and 8 Kurdish minorities were amongst those executed
11 Afghan nationals were executed

At least 1,271 executions were recorded in the first ten months of 2025, almost double compared to the same period in 2024 when 685 executions were recorded. Of the 1,271 executions, 621 were on death row for drug-related offences, 568 were sentenced to qisas for murder, 53 for the security-related charges of efsad-fil-arz (corruption on earth), baghy and moharebeh, and 29 for rape charges. Of those, only 94 or 7% were announced by official sources.

36 women, 69 Afghan nationals, an Iraqi national and a man only referred to as a “foreign national” were amongst those executed.

On 30 October, IHRNGO welcomed a statement by the UN Fact-finding Mission (FFMI), which, quoting one of the its experts, stated: “If executions form part of a widespread and systemic attack against a civilian population, as a matter of policy, then those responsible – including the judges who impose capital punishment – may be held accountable for crimes against humanity.”

Source: Iran Human Rights, Staff, November 7, 2025

"One is absolutely sickened, not by the crimes that the wicked have committed,
but by the punishments that the good have inflicted."

— Oscar Wilde

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