Human Rights Watch condemns Iran executions
Iran’s Execution Campaign Against Protesters
Sep 11, 2026
Day after day, Iranian authorities are sending protesters, including teenagers, who took part in widespread protests from December 2025-January 2026 to the gallows.
Between March and August this year, a span of just five months, authorities arbitrarily executed at least 59 men on politically motivated and vague national security charges following grossly unfair trials.
Those put to death include at least 29 arrested in connection with the recent protests and at least 3 reportedly arrested in connection with the 2022 Woman, Life, Freedom protests. Several were teenagers aged 18 or 19 and many others in their early 20s.
Five were executed in public.
Human Rights Watch, along with our partners the Abdorrahman Boroumand Center for Human Rights in Iran, conducted interviews and reviewed evidence detailing how authorities have used summary proceedings, torture-tainted “confessions,” and public executions to weaponize of the death penalty in the aftermath of January 2026 massacres of protesters to instill fear and deter further public dissent.
Sasan Azadvar Jonaqani, 21, a karate champion, was arrested, convicted, and arbitrarily executed in under four months for acts such as allegedly breaking windows of a police bus.
Scores of other protesters and political dissidents, including women, children, and several people whose co-defendants have already been executed, remain at imminent risk of execution.
UN member states should put pressure on Iranian authorities to end the crackdown but until then, the message in Iran is clear: protests will be met with brutality, whether through bullets on the streets or public executions following sham trials.”
Copyright 2026 Human Rights Watch
