By Kevin Kim
Impunity Watch Reporter, Middle East

TEHRAN, Iran – An Iranian man has been hanged despite judicial order to stay the execution pending review of the case.

Makwan Mouloudzadeh, 20, was hanged for allegedly raping three teenage boys when he was 13 years old. The hanging took place on Wednesday morning at the prison in the western city of Kermanshah. Mouloudzadeh’s family was later told to come and pick up his body.

“On 11 November the head of the justice administration of Kermanshah received an order from the judiciary head, Ayatollah Mahmoud Hashemi Shahroudi, to stop the verdict being carried out,” said his lawyer, “but the case, which was supposed to be reviewed in Tehran, was sent back from there to Kermanshah, and the execution was carried out quickly.”

On May 2007, a Kermanshah court ordered Mouloudzadeh’s execution despite “a trial filled with irregularities.” During trial, all of his accusers withdrew their accusations against him and Mouloudzadeh himself testified that his confession to the crime was coerced by the police. The judge, however, did not accept their testimonies and tried Mouloudzadeh under the “crimes of chastity.”

“Crimes of chastity” such as rape is a capital offence in Iran, which also include murder, armed robbery, serious drug trafficking, apostasy, adultery and homosexual acts between men. Under Iranian law, judgments against rape are not subject to the regular appellate process, and are instead directly reviewed by the country’s Supreme Court.

Iran is notorious for executing juvenile offenders – persons under 18 at the time of the crime. Even though Iran is party to the Convention on the Rights of the Child and the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, which bar the imposition of the death penalty to juvenile offenders, the Iranian government has already executed two others this year. So far, Iran has executed 27 minors since 1990.

For more information, please see:

Reuters – Arbour rebukes Iran for hanging juvenile offender – 7 December 2007

BBC News – Iranian hanged after verdict stay – 6 December 2007

AFP – Young Iranian hanged despite judiciary order – 6 December 2007

Human Rights Watch – Prevent execution of juvenile offender – 5 December 2007

Human Rights Watch – Revoke death sentence in juvenile case – 3 November 2007