Iran Sentences Four More To Death Over Mass Protests, Rights Groups Say

This article was originally published in Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty (RFE/RL). Read the original article.

By Frud Bezhan andHannah Kaviani

Iran has sentenced four more protesters, including a woman, to death over mass demonstrations in January that posed one of the biggest threats to the country’s clerical rulers in years, according to two human rights groups.

The authorities have so far executed seven people in connection with the protests, which were crushed in an unprecedented government crackdown that left thousands of people dead, rights groups said. Tens of thousands of others were detained or summoned for questioning.

Human rights defenders have repeatedly accused Iran of using the death penalty to instill fear in society in the wake of a wave of anti-government protests in recent years.

Branch 26 of the Tehran Revolutionary Court convicted the four protesters of carrying out acts on behalf of the United States and “hostile groups,” the US-based Human Rights Activists News Agency (HRANA) and the Abdorrahman Boroumand Center, a British-based organization that promotes human rights in Iran, said in separate statements.

See Also: Iran Announces First Legal Execution in Nationwide Anti-Khamenei Protest: 26-Year-Old Erfan Soltani to Be Hanged to Death as Unrest Intensifies

It was not immediately clear when the verdict was issued.

The four were accused of taking part in the anti establishment demonstrations in the capital Tehran in January, chanting protest slogans, throwing objects at security forces, damaging public property, and injuring a member of the paramilitary Basij force.

They were identified as Mohammadreza Majidi-Asl and his wife Bita Hemmati. The others were Behrouz Zamaninejad and Kourosh Zamaninejad, two men who lived in the same apartment building as the couple.

First Female Protester Sentenced To Death

Hemmati is believed to be the first woman to be sentenced to death over the demonstrations that erupted on December 28, 2025, and continued for weeks.

Amir Hemmati, a fifth person and a relative of the married couple, was sentenced to five years in prison on the charge of “assembly and collusion against national security,” as well as eight months in jail for “propaganda against the regime.”

“The ruling contains vague accusations against the protesters, which do not meet the ‘most serious crimes’ threshold for capital punishment, interpreted as intentional killing,” the Abdorrahman Boroumand Center said in its statement on April 14.

“The ruling failed to provide detailed evidence of each defendant’s role or to attribute specific acts to individual defendants,” the statement added.

HRANA said in an April 13 statement that “reports concerning possible coerced confessions are among the issues that, according to legal experts, may raise serious questions about the judicial process.”

“No information has been released regarding the defendants’ access to counsel of their choosing, the details of the court sessions, or their conditions of detention,” it added.

Copyright (c)2025 RFE/RL, Inc. Used with the permission of Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty 

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