Iran Carries Out Four Secret Executions This Week

Iran carried out four secret executions this week, including two Kurdish political activists and two Iraqi nationals. Amnesty International recorded 2,159 executions in Iran during 2025, the highest total of any country. Iran executed four men without notifying their families or allowing final visits, according to reports from human rights groups.

Maroufpour were put to death at the central prison in Naqadeh. Iran's judiciary said both men had been convicted of armed uprising, attempted assassination, and forming a group to disrupt national security. The judiciary stated the verdicts relied on confessions obtained in custody and that both men received legal representation at trial.

The Supreme Court upheld the sentences. Hengaw reported that Zale was arrested in July 2024 and sentenced after a hearing that lasted only a few minutes without his chosen lawyer present. He had been held for more than 500 days before execution. Maroufpour, 29, was arrested in March 2021.

Monitors said he was beaten during arrest, held without family contact for an extended period, and tried in proceedings his lawyers described as unfair.

Iraqi citizens, Ali Nader al-Obeidi, 27, and Fazel Sheikh Karim, 29, were executed at dawn on 6 April at Karaj Central Prison on espionage charges. Neither their families nor official media were informed. Iran Human Rights said both men spent approximately 11 months in security detention before sentencing without access to lawyers of their choosing.

With these four deaths, the number of people executed in Iran on espionage-related charges since the start of the war has risen to at least eight.

The organization also reported more than 200 executions in Iran so far in 2026. At least 10,642 people have been executed in Iran since 2010, according to Amnesty's cumulative data.