According to official data released by the United Nations, the Islamic Republic of Iran executed nearly 1,000 people in 2024, ranking second only to China in absolute numbers, and first in the world in executions per capita.
Disturbingly, the pace of executions in 2025 has already surpassed last year’s rate. In just the first six months of 2025, more than 520 people have been executed in Iran. If this trend continues, the total number of executions for the year is expected to exceed 1,000, marking a historic and tragic escalation.
In the wake of the recent military conflict between ruling regime of Iran and Israel, the Islamic Republic has intensified its domestic crackdown. Since the outbreak of war in June 2025, Iranian authorities have arrested over 700 citizens on vague or politically motivated charges such as “collaboration with Israel” or “disturbing national security.” At least six individuals have already been executed under accusations of espionage for Israel.
These figures represent more than just numbers, they are concrete evidence of a systematic campaign of state violence, raising serious concerns that the regime is using the war as a pretext to settle scores with its own people.
The International Organisation to Preserve Human Rights strongly warns that:
A regime facing military and diplomatic defeats may turn its wrath inward, targeting innocent citizens as scapegoats for its failures;
The unprecedented rise in executions and mass arrests points to a deliberate state strategy of repression, intimidation, and revenge;
The international community must not allow the people of Iran to become collateral damage in the Islamic Republic’s political survival game.
IOPHR urgently calls upon all democratic governments, human rights organisations, and international institutions to:
1. Closely monitor the human rights situation in Iran, particularly the treatment of civilians in wartime conditions;
2. Deploy any and all legal, diplomatic, or economic instruments necessary to protect Iranian citizens from unrestrained state violence;
3. Reject any engagement with the Iranian regime that overlooks its ongoing human rights abuses.
The innocent citizens of Iran must not pay the price for the regime’s military failures.
The world must not forget them, or leave them alone in the face of state vengeance.
International Organisation to Preserve Human Rights (IOPHR)
June 26, 2025