The EU condemns the increasing recourse to death sentences and executions in the Islamic Republic of Iran, the 27-nation bloc said in a statement issued by Slovenia, the current holder of its rotating Presidency.
It urged Iran to abolish the death penalty in line with the United Nations General Assembly resolution adopted in December 2007 on a Moratorium on the use of the death penalty.
It highlighted the case of Zohreh Kabiri, Azar Kabiri and Abdollah Farivar, who it said were at imminent threat of death by stoning. Despite the moratorium on stoning, which the EU was informed of by the Iranian side during the second round of the EU-Iran human rights dialogue in 2003, these punishments remain on the statute books in the Islamic Republic of Iran and sentences are still handed down by judges and carried out in practice, it added.
The EU urges the Iranian Government to abolish the use of cruel and degrading punishments and to abolish immediately, in law and in practice, the use of stoning as a method of execution – as called for in the most recent UN General Assembly resolution on the Situation of human rights in the Islamic Republic of Iran, adopted by the General Assembly in December 2007, the statement said.
The EU is also deeply concerned about three cases of juvenile offenders who have been sentenced to death. The EU notes that this is a direct contravention of the Islamic Republic of Irans international commitments, specifically the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights and the Convention on the Rights of the Child, both clearly prohibiting the execution of minors or people who have been convicted of crimes committed when they were minors.
The EU urges the Islamic Republic of Iran to comply with International Law and to immediately halt the executions of Mr Mahyar, Mr Mohammad Latif, Mr. Behnam Zare and of all other juvenile offenders, taking in consideration alternative sentences for juvenile offenders, it said.
