Iran has hanged 9 convicted drug traffickers in current days, state media reported Tuesday, because it retains up one of many world’s highest charges of execution.
Three had been hanged at a jail within the northwestern province of Ardabil on costs of “shopping for and transporting heroin and opium”, the official IRNA information company mentioned.
The opposite six had been executed individually on costs of trafficking “methamphetamine, heroin and hashish”, it added.
Iran lies on a serious opium-smuggling route between Afghanistan and Europe and has one of many world’s highest charges of home opiate use.
Figures cited by the UN Workplace on Medication and Crime (UNODC) in 2021 recommend 2.8 million folks have a drug downside in Iran.
Iranian authorities have launched a number of campaigns to battle drug abuse and trafficking, and often announce giant seizures of opiates smuggled from neighbouring Afghanistan.
In June, Amnesty Worldwide reported that Iranian authorities had executed no less than 173 folks convicted of drug-related offences in the course of the first 5 months of 2023.
The determine made up round two thirds of all executions in Iran throughout that interval, it added.
Iran says executions are carried out solely after exhaustive authorized proceedings and are a vital deterrent towards drug trafficking.
It executes extra folks per 12 months than another nation besides China, in line with Amnesty.
The Norway-based Iran Human Rights group mentioned in November that the Islamic republic had executed greater than 700 folks in 2023, the very best determine in eight years.
