Iran executes more than 30 people in 10 days as European officials visit

Iran has executed at least 30 people in 10 days, Iran Human Rights have claimed, the state-sanctioned killings coinciding with the visits of European officials to Tehran. The high number of people subjected to capital punishment over the 10-day period comes less than a month after Amnesty International released a report highlighting the increase in executions in the Islamic Republic in 2015,

In its April 6 annual Death Penalty report, the charity said: "Iran put at least 977 people to death in 2015, compared to at least 743 the year before. Iran alone accounted for 82% of all executions recorded" in the Middle East and North Africa region, Amnesty added.

The National Council of Resistance of Iran (NCRI) said in a statement that the increasing trend of executions "aimed at intensifying the climate of terror to rein in expanding protests by various strata of the society, especially at a time of visits by high-ranking European officials, demonstrates that the claim of moderation is nothing but an illusion for this medieval regime."

European officials visiting Iran at the time of the executions have not commented on the executions, despite the controversy surrounding their visit to the country.

However, in the Foreign Office's Annual Human Rights Report for 2015, released on 21 April, it stated Iran's human rights record 'continued to cause great concern'.

It stated that the UN special rapporteur for human rights in Iran believed up to 1,025 people were executed in the country in 2015, and pledged to continue to raise individual cases with the Iranian government.