Preparations for a public hanging in Iran. Photo: Wiki Commons.

i24 News – At least seven people, including two women, were hanged in Iran on Saturday as the Islamic Republic has further intensified its use of capital punishment, a monitor said.

The Norway-based Iran Human Rights (IHR) said it has tallied at least 223 executions this year, with at least 50 so far in May alone. A new surge began following the end of the Persian New Year and Ramadan holidays in April, with 115 people including six women hanged since then.

Second only to China in the overall number of executions, Iran carries out more recorded executions of women than any other country.

Iran last year carried out more hangings than in any year since 2015, according to human right monitors, which accuse the mullah regime of using capital punishment as a means to instill fear in the wake of protests that erupted in autumn 2022.

Rights group say the death penalty is dispassionately used against Iran’s ethnic and religious minorities, such as Kurds, Turks, Arabs and Balochis.

Iran has been roiled by occasional bursts of unrest since the death of Mahsa Amini in September 16, 2022. The 22-year-old Iranian-Kurdish woman fell into a coma and died three days later following her arrest by the morality police for allegedly violating the Islamic dress code.

The incident unleashed years of pent-up anger over issues from tightening social and political controls to economic hardships, triggering the clerical establishment’s worst legitimacy crisis in decades.