Iran Human Rights (IHRNGO); May 20, 2024: Mojtaba Pouyande, Mostafa Aghayi, Nader Ghorbani and an unidentified Afghan national were executed for murder and drug charges in Shiraz Central Prison.
According to information obtained by Iran Human Rights, four men were executed in Shiraz (Adel Abad) Central Prison on 19 May. Three of the men have been identified as Mojtaba Jouyandeh, around 40 years old, 35-year-old Mostafa Aghayi and 28-year-old Nader Ghorbani. The fourth man who was an Afghan national has not been identified at the time of writing.
Mojtaba and Mostafa were sentenced to qisas (retribution-in-kind) for murder. Nader and the unidentified Afghan man were on death row for murder or drug charges.
All four men were on death row for 3-4 years and had been transferred to Shiraz Central Prison for execution from Pirbanu Prison.
IHRNGO previously reported that around 50 men were on death row in Pirbanu Prison and prisoners were told that 15-20 of them would soon be transferred to Shiraz Central Prison for execution.
At the time of writing, their executions have not been reported by domestic media or officials in Iran.
Drug-related executions have continuously risen every year since 2021. According to IHRNGO’s 2023 Annual Report on the Death Penalty, at least 471 people were executed for drug-related charges, an 84% increase compared to 2022 (256) and about 18 times the average of drug-related executions in 2018-2020.
On 10 April 2024, 80+ Iranian and international organisations and groups called for joint action to stop drug-related executions, urging UNODC to make “any cooperation with the Islamic Republic contingent on a complete halt on drug-related executions.”