Every man in an Iranian village has been executed for drugs offences, a human rights group has claimed.
Shahindokht Molaverdi, the country’s vice president for women and family affairs, claimed that men from Sistan and Baluchestan had been killed.
She told state agency Mehr earlier this week: ‘We have a village in Sistan and Baluchestan where every single man has been executed. The children [of these men] are potential drug traffickers.’
It is unclear if the men were executed at the same time or if they have been killed separately over a period of time.
Iran is the world’s second most prolific executioner with nearly two thirds of all hangings relating to alleged drugs offences.
The Sistan and Baluchistan province borders Afghanistan and Pakistan and has been the site of thousands of deaths, some of which followed smuggling conflicts.
Around 600 out of 947 hangings were linked to drugs last year while 31 have already been carried out this year, according to Reprieve.
Maya Foa, head of the death penalty team at Reprieve, said: ‘The apparent hanging of every man in one Iranian village demonstrates the astonishing scale of Iran’s execution spree.
Source: / Dailyuk.co.uk /