ERBIL, Kurdistan Region - Iran carried out the death sentence of a Kurdish prisoner after spending 15 years in prison, a human rights watchdog reported on Wednesday.
Hengaw Organization for Human Rights reported that Khsraw Besharat, a Kurdish prisoner from Mahabad, who had spent 15 years in a prison in Karaj, was executed by Iran.
According to Hengaw, Besharat was transferred to solitary confinement on May 1.
Besharat was arrested in December 2009 along with six others. In 2016, a Tehran revolutionary court sentenced them to death on alleged charges of murder, action against national security, propaganda against the government, membership in Salafi groups, and corruption on earth.
On May 1, the Iranian judiciary carried out the death sentence of Anwar Khezri, one of Besharat’s co-defendants in the same case.
Iranian media affiliated with the country’s judiciary have not yet reported Besharat’s execution.
Iran is consistently one of the countries with the highest rate of known executions around the world. Many of those who are executed in Iran are convicted based on confessions condemned by rights groups as often obtained under duress.
Amnesty International reported last month that at least 853 people were executed across Iran in 2023, marking a 48 percent increase from the previous year, and the highest execution rate since 2015.
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