Hamidreza Azari, 17, was hanged by Iran authorities on November 24, 2023 (Human Rights Activists)

UPDATE 1029 GMT:

The head of Iran’s Deaf Sports Federation, has been fired over images emerged of a foreign woman athlete without a compulsory headscarf at a tournament in Tehran.

Iranian media circulated photos of the athlete, wearing shorts and a tight tank top, at the Asian Deaf Athletics Championships.

Tishehgaran denied any wrongdoing, saying the Championships were conducted in “full compliance” with Islamic principles and the laws of the Islamic Republic.

In May, the head of the Iran Athletics Federation was forced to resign after women without hijab participated in a marathon in Shiraz.

UPDATE 1021 GMT:

Human rights lawyer Khosro Alikordi has been sentenced to one year in prison, followed by a two-year exile to Nehbandan in eastern Iran.

Alikordi was convicted of “engaging in propaganda activities against the Islamic Republic in favor of anti-system groups” through interviews with foreign media and social media posts.

He has been banned from practicing law, engaging in social media activities, and leaving the country for a period of two years.

Alikordi said he was punished for representing families of victims during nationwide protests since September 2022. They included arrested relatives of Abolfazl Adinezadeh, a 16-year-old boy was shot and killed by security forces last year.

UPDATE, NOV 29:

The UN Human Rights Office has deplored the executions both of protester Milad Zohrevand and of 17-year-old Hamidreza Azari.

Spokesperson Elizabeth Throssell said in a statement:

Available information indicates that [Zohrevand’s] trial lacked the basic requirements for due process under international human rights law. There are also troubling reports that Zohrevand’s parents were arrested following his execution.

We deplore the executions.

Throssell noted that Iran, with its surge in executions, is among the countries with the highest use of the death penalty, particularly for drug-related offences. Minorities are disproportionately sentenced to die.

She said Iran should establish a moratorium on the killings.

“We also call on the government to stop using criminal procedures to punish political activists and others for exercising their rights to freedom of speech and peaceful assembly,” the spokesperson added.

ORIGINAL ENTRY, NOV 28: Nobel Peace Prize laureate Narges Mohammadi, a political prisoner in Tehran, has said Iran’s rise in executions is a “disgrace to the oppressive and authoritarian system”.

Mohammadi posted on Instagram on Sunday:

The execution machine has accelerated across the country, conveying the message of the oppressive Islamic Republic to society: the continuation of massacre and execution.

I do not consider it anything other than the “war” of the government with all its tools of suppression and death against the oppressed, protesting, and defenseless people of Iran.

Last Thursday, Milad Zohrevand, 21, was hanged at dawn in a prison in Hamadan in western Iran. He is the eighth participant in the “Woman. Life. Freedom” protests put to death.

See also Iran’s Regime Executes Another Protester

A day later, Hamidreza Azari, 17, was hanged after he allegedly carried out an “honor” killing. His supporters say his confession was forced.

Mohammadi said the executions will eventually spur further mass protests. She urged UN Human Rights Commissioner Volker Türk to take decisive and swift action “in the name of humanity”.

More than 600 people were executed by Iran between January and October 2023, according to the Norway-based activists Iran Human Rights.

That is a further rise from at least 582 executions in 2022; 333 in 2021; and 267 people in 2020.

In May, three UN Special Rapporteurs condemned the hangings of three protesters and urged the regime to “halt the appalling wave of executions in Iran”. They cited reports of unfair proceedings, torture, and “other forms of ill treatment to extract forced confessions”.