ICHRI reports, reliable sources have told them 26 people were hanged secretly in Mashhad on June 15, 2011.
Mashhad’s Prosecutor General Mahmoud Zoghi, without giving actual numbers, recently acknowledged the number of executions has been “very high” in Mashhad within the past two years.
According to the International Campaign for Human Rights in Iran, there was an unannounced secret mass execution of twenty six death row inmates on June 15, 2011.
Most of the people executed in this mass execution were charged with trafficking, possession and purchase and sale of drugs.
Against Iranian Judiciary law, these executions took place without the knowledge or presence of the families and attorneys of those executed. Neither was the Supreme Court’s final ruling confirming the death sentences given to attorneys or the prisoners themselves.
Even the defendants themselves were not informed of High Court’s final ruling or their execution date in advance. They were only informed of their upcoming execution a few hours before their sentences were carried out.
According to information obtain by ICHRI, in these cases, the notifications of the Supreme Court’s final ruling upholding the death sentence, and the death sentence enforcement order from the Prosecutor General of Iran were only provided to Mashhad’s Prosecutor General.
Previously, in his press interviews, Mr. Mohseni Ejei the Prosecutor General of Iran, has repeatedly reiterated his instructions to the country’s prosecutors that death sentences must be promptly carried out.
Mashhad’s Prosecutor General, Zoghi, has confirmed unannounced mass executions in Mashhad. He has also acknowledged a high number of drug cases in Khorasan province. He said: “The number of executions is proportional to the high volume of drug-related cases but foreign news media have exaggerated this issue”.
He has acknowledged the unannounced secret mass executions in Mashhad’s Vakilabad prison and has called it “normal” occurrence. He has also said “According to the law of drug control and reinforcement, transportation, storage and sale of more than 30 grams of heroin is punishable by death”.
He said: “With the high rate of drugs that enter Khorasan Razavi province, the number of executions would naturally also be high”.
However, Zoghi, without giving an exact number of executions in the past two years, did acknowledge that, since March 21 this year, there have been 5 separate group executions in Mashhad Vakilabad prison.
Previously, ICHRI had reported unannounced mass execution of ten people on April 6, 2011, twelve executions on April 12, 2011, ten executions on May 16, 2011 and sixteen executions on May 22 and May 23, 2011.
The last secret unannounced mass execution in Mashhad was on June 15, 2011, where twenty six people were executed.
ICHRI says they have obtained information that secret unannounced mass executions have occurred in Birjand, Taibad, Ghezel Hesar, Ahvaz Karoon and in Uromiyeh prisons.
According to information obtained by ICHRI the most mass secret executions were performed in Gezel Hesar and Vakilabad prisons.
According to reliable sources and information given to ICHRI, there are thousands of death row inmates awaiting execution in Mashhad Vakilabad and Karaj Ghezel Hesar prisons, all convicted on drug charges.
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