The state-run daily Shargh, citing “collected statistics,” reported that “between 2011 and 2023, at least around 88 public executions were carried out in the country.” Quoting two legal experts and a psychologist, the newspaper emphasized that public executions no longer have a deterrent effect.
On Wednesday, October 22, Shargh published a report titled “Public Display of Harsh Punishments,” writing that “Fars, Khorasan, and Kermanshah provinces have the highest share of public executions.”
According to the report, other cities such as Yasuj, Arak, Ahvaz, Marvdasht, and Isfahan also have smaller shares.
UN Fact-Finding Mission Expresses Concern over Unprecedented Rise in Executions in Iran
The newspaper added: “According to the news, public executions have mainly been carried out in provincial centers with large populations or areas with high-profile criminal cases.” Shargh did not provide further explanation.
Referring to the fact that “the peak of executions occurred in the early 2010s, with over 30 cases in the first three years before declining,” the paper added: “In 2021, the number dropped to zero. However, since 2022, public executions have once again appeared in the news.”
The report mentioned the public execution of two people “for murder” in August this year in “Larestan County and Golestan Province.”
In another part of the report, Shargh emphasized that after reviewing the news from these years, it appears that the implementation of public executions “has had no impact in reducing violent crimes.”
Quoting social science and psychology experts, the newspaper wrote that public executions contribute to the “normalization of violence” and that “the public nature of punishment not only fails to promote deterrence or social calm but has an entirely opposite effect.”
Public Executions No Longer Have a Deterrent Effect
According to Shargh, attorney Abdolsamad Khorramshahi stated that under Iran’s judicial principles and criminal laws, executions should generally not be carried out publicly.
He explained that according to Article 4 of the regime’s so-called Islamic Penal Code, public execution is permissible only under special circumstances and with the proposal of the prosecuting attorney and the approval of the attorney general.
Khorramshahi emphasized that public executions can have widespread negative effects on society — they are not deterrents but instead reinforce violent behavior and harm the mental health of children and adolescents.
Shargh further wrote that in today’s conditions, with the expansion of social media, public executions have lost their deterrent power and have become a form of public spectacle for some segments of society.
Public Execution Does Not Lead to a Sustainable Reduction in Violence
Social psychiatrist Amir Hossein Jalali Nadooshan told Shargh that the presence of spectators at the scene of executions might evoke fear or a sense of social order in the short term, but in the long term it does not reduce violence because it is inconsistent with the cultural structure of society.
He added that repeating such scenes desensitizes the public to human suffering and fosters a kind of emotional indifference in society — where violence becomes normalized.
According to Jalali Nadooshan, when violence is used as a public display, it creates imitative behavior that seeps from public spaces into family and social relationships.
No Country Has Managed to Curb Crime Through Executions or Corporal Punishment
Quoting Ali Najafi Tavana, a legal expert and former head of the Central Bar Association, Shargh wrote that despite harsh punishments for drug traffickers, thugs, and other criminals, crime has not decreased but rather increased. He noted that prisons are overcrowded, forcing the government to release some inmates from time to time.
Najafi Tavana stressed that no country has been able to curb crime through executions or corporal punishment, and the path to crime control lies in prevention, respect for the people, and observance of civil rights.
He added that reducing crime requires meeting people’s basic needs, such as employment, housing, marriage, social security, and mental peace. He said that in a society dominated by poverty and discrimination, where the powerful enjoy lavish lives using the people’s wealth, “people, seeing such injustice, distance themselves from the law and no longer fear punishment.”
The Number of Executions in October Reached 280
Coinciding with Shargh’s report on public executions, the Iran Human Rights Society reported on Wednesday, October 22, that at least 28 prisoners were executed across prisons in Iran on October 21 and 22.
According to the report, with these executions, the total number recorded for October has reached 280, indicating that, on average, more than eight people per day — or one prisoner every three hours — were executed in Iran that month.
The executions of these 28 prisoners took place in the prisons of Birjand, Shiraz, Isfahan, Tehran, Kermanshah, Taybad, Yazd, Zanjan, Qazvin, Ghezel Hesar (Karaj), Gorgan, and Qom.
The organization described this October as “the bloodiest month for prisoners since the mass executions of 1988.”
Among those executed were Ebrahim Azizi in Birjand Prison; Nader Abdi and Alireza Keshavarz in Adelabad Prison, Shiraz; Saman Talebi and Habib Haqshenas in Dastgerd Prison, Isfahan; Sasan Lorestani and Shahram Mirzaei in Dizelabad Prison, Kermanshah; Khosro Vafadar in Qom Prison; and Mansour Iravani in Ghezel Hesar Prison, Karaj.
The executions were mostly on charges related to drug offenses, and in some cases, murder. Among those executed were several Afghan nationals, including Serajuddin Abitalebi, Mohammad Shams, and Mohammad Ebrahimi, all convicted of drug or murder charges.
The Iran Human Rights Society reported that some of the executions were carried out without informing the families or allowing a final visit.
UN Secretary-General António Guterres, in his latest report to the UN General Assembly on Tuesday, October 21, warned about the rise in executions, torture of detainees, suppression of minorities, and increasing restrictions on civil freedoms in Iran.
According to the report, in the first half of 2025, at least 612 people were executed in Iran — a 119% increase compared to the same period last year.
Guterres expressed regret over the Iranian regime’s disregard for international recommendations to halt the death penalty and limit capital offenses, calling public executions “inconsistent with the prohibition of torture and inhuman treatment.”
Amnesty International also announced on Thursday, October 16, that over 1,000 executions have been reported in Iran since the start of 2025 and called for an immediate halt to executions.
The international human rights organization reported that executions in Iran “follow unfair trials and are used to suppress protests and minorities.”
Earlier, on the occasion of the World Day Against the Death Penalty (October 10), the human rights website HRANA had reported that at least 1,537 people were executed in Iran over the past year.
