Mass executions reported in Mashhad Prison

International Campaign for Human Rights in Iran reports that a knowledgeable source has informed them that in the past few months over one hundred people have been executed in northeastern city of Mashhad.

According to this report: “Judicial authorities at Vakilabad Prison in Mashhad have executed over one hundred prisoners, a majority of which were convicted of drug-related charges.”

The report goes on to say: “Last Wednesday 68 people were hanged and in the coming weeks, the executions will continue.”

International Campaign for Human Rights in Iran announced that it will refrain from publishing detailed statistics in this regard until the information is “corroborated by other sources.”

The Campaign also urges Iranian judiciary to respond to the allegations of the weekly mass executions and “offer accurate information about what is going on in this prison.”

The cited source has also told the Campaign that Ayatollah Sadegh Larijani, head of the Iranian judiciary has recently written to the supreme leader of the Islamic Republic to inquire about the course of action the leader proposes to take regarding convicts.

Ahmad Ghabel, a religious scholar who was arrested last December in Neyshapur and released on bail after 170 days in prison, has told the Campaign that while he never saw any of the prisoners who were executed, he heard about them in prison.

He reports that the prison guards relayed news about the execution of 50 people during his 170 days in prison and according to these guards, two eighteen-year-olds were amongst the prisoners who were executed.

Ahmad Ghabel adds that they would transfer people they intended to execute to their sections, and “once they came, the situation would completely change.”

Ghabel says that he cannot directly confirm that 70 people were executed in the past week, but knows that families who have received the remains of their executed kin have seen this number in the forms.

The International Campaign for Human Rights in Iran also writes that it has been informed that the mass executions have become more frequent in the past month and “hundreds of prisoners sentenced to death are on death row in Mashhad’s Vakilabad Prison.”

Last week, the Green Voice of Freedom website also reported that in the past few days, 70 prisoners were suddenly executed in Mashhad Prison.”

It went on to say that “names of a number of minors could also be seen amongst the executed.”