The British Committee for Iran Freedom (BCFIF) condemns the hanging of political prisoners Behrouz Ehsani, 70, and Mehdi Hassani, 48, by the Iranian regime on Sunday morning. Both of them were sentenced to death on charges of membership in the democratic opposition group, the People’s Mojahedin Organisation of Iran (PMOI).

We also condemn the violent raid by armed special forces on the ward housing political prisoners in Qezelhessar Prison a day earlier to take the victims to solitary confinement for execution and forcibly transfer political prisoner Saeed Massouri to Zahedan Prison.

According to reports, 14 other political prisoners are reportedly at risk of executions on made-up charges of “enmity against God” and “corruption on earth”.

This is a very alarming development taking place on the anniversary of the massacre of 30,000 political prisoners in Iran’s prisons in 1988 where a majority of the victims were from the PMOI. Both the timing and the target suggest the regime could be preparing another series of mass executions in the country’s prisons.

Earlier this month, UN experts warned about the official rhetoric in Iran echoing that of the 1988 atrocities. They urged the international community to watch closely to see how Iranian authorities treat their own people. An editorial published on 7 July by Fars News Agency, affiliated with the IRGC, openly calls for a repeat of the 1988 massacre, describing it as a “successful historical experience” and “a commendable judicial act.”

Since the popular protests in 2022, the regime is increasingly using the death penalty and executions as a political tool to suppress dissent and crush the growing, pro-democracy protest and resistance movements. It is also using the judiciary and state media to justify and facilitate the state crackdown to stop future uprisings.

The executions and raid this weekend stress the urgent need for the UK and the international community to intervene to prevent another crime against humanity in Iran and save the lives of defenceless political prisoners on death row.

The British Committee for Iran Freedom (BCFIF) expects the UK Government to go beyond condemnation and take concrete actions to end impunity and hold the regime to account for the surge in executions, state crackdown and calculated targeting of political prisoners as well as ethnic and religious minorities, as we stressed in our statement on 25 April, which called for urgent action to save the lives of Behrouz Ehsani and Mehdi Hassani.

These efforts must include imposing targeted human rights sanctions on the judges and officials responsible for these executions that follow unfair trials, including Supreme Leader Khamenei.

We also back the recommendations proposed by the President-elect of the National Council of Resistance of Iran (NCRI), Mrs Maryam Rajavi, at a meeting in the parliament on 16 July and call on the UK and E3 to condition all diplomatic and economic relations with the regime on the immediate cessation of executions and release of political prisoners in Iran.

British Committee for Iran Freedom

28 July 2025