ERBIL, Kurdistan Region - Iran has executed two more individuals accused of links to an opposition group and involvement in attacks on state institutions, according to state media.
“Two enemy elements inside the country who participated in numerous terrorist operations in Tehran were hanged after the legal process, and the Supreme Court's verdict was confirmed,” Iran’s state broadcaster said in an announcement.
The executions follow a series of similar actions by Iranian authorities in recent weeks amid its ongoing war with the US and Israel, including cases tied to alleged espionage for Israel, participation in January’s nationwide protests and links to dissident groups.
The broadcaster said the two were in contact with a leader of the dissident Mojahedin Khalq Organization (MKO/MEK), a leftist Islamist group established before Iran’s 1979 Islamic Revolution, and had carried out attacks on “sensitive centers and public places using launchers.”
The Iran Human Rights Society said families of political prisoners gathered outside Tehran’s notorious Evin Prison, holding placards reading “no to execution” and carrying photos of detained relatives, according to videos it said showed the scene.
The group said six political prisoners - Babak Alipour, Pouya Ghobadi Bistuni, Vahid Bani Amerian, Seyyed Abolhassan Montazer, Seyyed Mohammad Taghavi and Ali Akbar Daneshvarkar - were sentenced to “death, imprisonment, and exile” by Judge Iman Afshari of Branch 26 of the Tehran Revolutionary Court.
Alipour was arrested in early 2024 and transferred to Evin Prison. He had previously been detained in November 2018 with his brother and sentenced to several years in prison on charges of alleged membership in the MKO and “insulting the leadership.