Death Penalty News

‘My biggest dream is that there will be Pride in the streets of Tehran’ Growing up in Iran, where homosexuality is punishable with the death penalty, Majid Parsa (pseudonym) struggled to accept his sexuality - until he discovered Tehran’s secret gay scene. But it was only when he moved to the UK that he found love and liberation, as he reveals here in Attitude's Rainbow World feature

Iranians in Tehran illicitly filmed scenes of their capital for Israeli Channel 12 news, an act that constitutes espionage in Iran and can warrant a death penalty. The clips, broadcast on Saturday, showed locals at high-end shopping malls that the videographers said are only financially accessible to those connected to the regime. “I filmed this video with great difficulty and fear, and I said I would send it to the Israeli Channel 12,” said a 44-year-old Iranian who sent footage for the report and went by the alias Ali, speaking in Persian. “I committed a dangerous act. If you just talk to Israelis, you become a spy and they will execute you.”

Iran’s new chastity and hijab law has drawn criticism from journalists and activists who warn it represents a new weapon in the state's arsenal against women which could authorize extreme punishments including the death penalty and flogging. The new Hijab and Chastity law, approved by parliament in September 2023 and finalized by the Guardian Council in September 2024, enforces compulsory hijab with harsher penalties, including hefty fines, longer prison sentences, and restrictions on employment and education.

After the September 2022 death in custody of Mahsa Amini and the subsequent protests, Iranian universities have also faced heightened repression and intensified control. The government's new "Population Growth" initiative, coupled with mandatory hijab laws, has transformed universities into enforcers of these policies, placing additional pressure on female students. Under the policy, universities offer academic grades and incentives for observing mandatory hijab, marrying, or having children, effectively turning these institutions into vehicles for promoting the Islamic Republic’s ideological goals.

The Iranian government executed at least eight more prisoners early Monday morning, according to reports from human rights groups, with hundreds already hanged in 2024. This latest round of executions, which took place in Yazd and Shiraz prisons, is part of a broader trend that has seen the number of state-sanctioned killings skyrocket in 2023 and 2024, drawing international condemnation and sparking renewed calls for an end to the death penalty in Iran.

The President of the Islamic Republic of Iran, Ebrahim Raisi and his Foreign Minister Amir-Abdollahian are missing after the helicopter carrying them crashed in the middle of the Dizmar forest. DUBAI, May 19 (Reuters) - A helicopter carrying Iranian President Ebrahim Raisi and his foreign minister crashed on Sunday as it was crossing mountain terrain in heavy fog on the way back from a visit to the border with Azerbaijan, an Iranian official told Reuters. The official said the lives of Raisi and Foreign Minister Hossein Amirabdollahian were "at risk following the helicopter crash".

At least seven people, including two women, were hanged in Iran on Saturday as the Islamic Republic has further intensified its use of capital punishment, a monitor said. The Norway-based Iran Human Rights (IHR) said it has tallied at least 223 executions this year, with at least 50 so far in May alone. A new surge began following the end of the Persian New Year and Ramadan holidays in April, with 115 people including six women hanged since then.

The punishment for not wearing a hijab is largely financial, although there are new systems to report women not complying with hijab rules to the morality police. Iranian women are refusing to comply with hijab rules in Iran, ABC News reported, as reporters recently conducted an investigation in Tehran. Not wearing a hijab is punishable by the Iranian morality police, who generally patrol the streets of Iran. 

For a country that executes gay people, it offers a surprising procedure. But those going through it face unqualified doctors and humiliation. Death or surgery? It’s a capital offence to be gay in Iran. But gender-change surgery is legal. Now, 4000 Iranians are undergoing the life-changing procedure every year. And many of them are juveniles. The plight of Iran’s lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) was brought back to the attention of the world after the belated arrest of a provincial “morality police” chief last month after video of him engaging in homosexual acts began circulating on social media. Seven of his sexual partners were arrested immediately. Then, after six months of public outrage, Reza Seghati, the director general of the Office of the Ministry of Culture in Iran’s Gilan province, was detained. Seghati was just one of a half-dozen similar exposes in the past year involving senior members of Iran’s clerical religious ruling class. RELATED |  Iran’s governm...

All women in Iran have been required by law to cover their neck and head since shortly after the 1979 Islamic Revolution Iranian authorities have whipped a woman 74 times for “violating public morals” and fined her for not covering her head, the judiciary said. “The convicted, Roya Heshmati, encouraged permissiveness [by appearing] disgracefully in busy public places in Tehran,” the judiciary’s Mizan Online website said late on Saturday.

Iranian media say the governorate of the central city of Qom has issued a directive mandating female employees in government offices adhere to strict Islamic dress codes, specifically wearing a black chador, a large piece of cloth that is wrapped around the head and upper body leaving only the face exposed, and refraining from using makeup. The directive, initially disclosed by the Iran Watch rights group's website, marks a further tightening of the Islamic republic's stance on how women can dress in the workplace.

Khamenei’s regime stands as not only one of the world’s major violators of human rights but also as a leading state supporter of global terrorism. In the midst of the tragic scenes of violence and bloodshed unfolding in Gaza, a parallel and systematic effort is taking place in Iran, where the clerical dictatorship is orchestrating a series of large-scale executions. These state-sanctioned murders not only showcase the regime’s brutality but also highlight its willingness to use every opportunity to maintain its hold on power. Disturbingly, the regime’s Judiciary recently authorized the execution of 25 prisoners during the month of Shahrivar (August 23- September 22). As tensions escalated in Gaza during Mehr (September 23- October 22), the tally of executions surged to a distressing 81. As of Aban month (October 23- November 21), the count stands at a chilling 106.

Armita Geravand’s death comes after her being in a coma for weeks and threatens to reignite popular anger, protests over Iran’s mandatory headscarf law for women DUBAI, United Arab Emirates (AP) — An Iranian teenage girl injured weeks ago in a mysterious incident on Tehran’s Metro while not wearing a headscarf has died, state media reported Saturday. The death of Armita Geravand comes after her being in a coma for weeks in Tehran and after the one-year anniversary of the death of 22-year-old Mahsa Amini which sparked nationwide protests at the time.

"The Norwegian Nobel Committee has decided to award the 2023 Nobel Peace Prize to Narges Mohammadi for her fight against the oppression of women in Iran and her fight to promote human rights and freedom for all," the committee said in its citation. Mohammadi is one of Iran's leading human rights activists, who has campaigned for women's rights and the abolition of the death penalty. She is currently serving multiple sentences in Tehran's Evin Prison amounting to about 12 years imprisonment, according to the Front Line Defenders rights organisation, one of the many periods she has been detained behind bars. 

Iran joined this Commission dedicated to promoting gender equality as a new member on Tuesday, for a four-year mandate. The news was received coldly. Several new members, including Iran and Pakistan, were elected Tuesday to join the United Nations Commission on the Status of Women (CSW) - an intergovernmental body "dedicated exclusively to promoting gender equality and “empowerment of women ”, it is written on the UN website . The CSW is a 45-member functional commission belonging to the United Nations Economic and Social Council (ECOSOC), and was established in 1946. At an ECOSOC session on Tuesday, 12 new members were elected to join the CSW in 2022 and for a four-year term. 

Nearly a year after mass protests erupted in Iran, the country’s president, Ebrahim Raisi, defended his government’s response to the demonstrations in an interview with NBC News, and warned that those who try to sow instability in the Islamic Republic would pay a “big cost.” In his first interview with a Western news organization since the death of Mahsa Amini in police custody triggered public outrage last year, Raisi told NBC News’ Lester Holt that the unrest was allegedly fueled by U.S. and European powers and that security forces had treated protesters in a “peaceful” manner.

TEHRAN, Iran (AP) — Snap checkpoints. Internet disruptions. University purges. Iran's theocracy is trying hard to both ignore the upcoming anniversary of nationwide protests over the country's mandatory headscarf law and tamp down on any possibility of more unrest. Yet the Sept. 16 death of 22-year-old Mahsa Amini still reverberates across Iran. Some women are choosing to go without the headscarf, or hijab, despite an increasing crackdown by authorities. Graffiti, likely against Iran's government, is rapidly painted over in black by Tehran's municipal workers. University professors have been fired over their apparent support for demonstrators.

CNN  —  A new draft law that would enshrine harsh punishments for women and girls who fail to wear a hijab in Iran could amount to “gender apartheid,” UN experts said in a statement on Friday. “The draft law could be described as a form of gender apartheid, as authorities appear to be governing through systemic discrimination with the intention of suppressing women and girls into total submission,” the experts said. The proposed legislation, which is currently under review by the Iranian parliament, would establish harsh penalties for women who refuse to wear the veil – including long jail sentences.

Iran’s morality police will resume patrols to make women comply with strict Islamic dress codes, state media reported Sunday, 10 months after the death of a young woman in their custody triggered nationwide protests. Saeid Montazeralmahdi, spokesman for Iran’s enforcement body, Faraja, said police will restart vehicle and foot patrols across the country from Sunday, the state-run Fars news agency reported. Officers will first warn women who are not complying, while those who “insist on breaking the norms,” may face legal action, he said.

Thousands have been arrested in the clampdown, with the judiciary handing down harsh sentences -- including the death penalty -- to protesters. Five more teachers who supported anti-government protests in Iran have been summoned to the Revolutionary Court, the latest in a series of similar moves, including trials, of teachers in other cities across the country. The Iranian Teachers' Union's Coordination Council has confirmed the collective summons of teachers and cultural rights activists in the central Iranian city of Yazd. Three of the teachers, Ahmad Changizi, Mehdi Kalantari, and Hamideh Zare, were previously arrested following a nationwide teachers' rally in May 2022, which coincided with Teacher's Day in Yazd. The other two are Mansor Mirzaei and Mohammad Fakhralhosseini.