Two Iranian political dissidents face execution as human rights organisations warn that time is running out.
Vahid Bani Amerian, 34, and Abolhassan Montazer, 68, are at risk of being killed according to rights groups including Oslo-based NGO Iran Human Rights and Amnesty International.
It follows the execution of teenager Amirhossein Hatami on Thursday after he took part in the January protests in Iran. Hatami was found guilty of entering a restricted military site in Tehran where he allegedly damaged and set fire to the facility.
Four other protesters, Mohammad Amin Biglari, Ali Fahim, Abolfazl Salehi Siavashani and Shahin Vahedparast Kolo will be executed soon, with one execution per day, according to prosecution officials.
An additional four political dissidents have already been hanged in “arbitrary and secret executions” this week according to Amnesty.
Babak Alipour and Pouya Ghobadi were executed on Wednesday after Akbar (Shahrokh) Danesvarkar and Mohammad Taghavi Sangdehi on Tuesday, the group said.
“Fears have now intensified over the fate of Vahid Bani Amerian and Abolhassan Montazer, convicted in the same case following a grossly unfair torture-tainted trial,” said Diana Eltahawy, Amnesty International’s deputy regional director for the Middle East and North Africa.
“The authorities have refused to provide any information regarding their fate and whereabouts to their families or lawyers since their transfer to an unidentified location on 30 March.”
The organisations says that at least 11 men (including Hatami) have reported being “subjected to torture and other ill-treatment in detention including beatings, floggings, prolonged solitary confinement, and death threats”. They say that the prisoners have been convicted in “grossly unfair trials that relied on forced ‘confessions’ extracted under torture and last only a few hours”.
Amerian, Montazer and their co-defendants Alipour, Ghabadi, Akbar, Daneshvarkar and Sangdehi were sentenced to death by an Iranian Revolutionary Court in Tehran in October 2024 after being convicted of “armed rebellion against the state” (baghi). They alleged that the men were affiliated with banned opposition group the People’s Mojahedin Organisation of Iran (PMOI).
They had repeatedly denied taking up arms against the state with Amnesty calling the proceedings “grossly unfair”.
On Sunday evening (29 March) Daneshvarkar, Sangdehi were transferred from Section 4 of the Ghezel Hesar prison to an unidentified location. The day after their executions were announced by authorities.
Four other men including Ghobadi and Alipour who were executed this week, were then transferred from Section 4 to an unidentified location. Rights groups warn that Amerian and Montazer now face the same fate.
The National Council of Resistance in Iran called for “urgent action by the United Nations, the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, the UN Human Rights Council, the UN Special Rapporteur on the situation of human rights in Iran, and all international human rights organizations to ascertain the condition of the political prisoners from Unit 4 of Ghezel Hesar Prison and to prevent the execution of Abolhassan, Vahid, and other political prisoners.”
Last year, IHRN, announced that Iran had carried out a “mass killing campaign”, carrying out the highest number of executions in three decades in 2025. More than 1,000 people were executed between January and September 2025.
US president Donald Trump had previously told protesters that “help is on its way” as demonstrators took to the streets of Iran across the country. Rights groups suggest over 5,000 people have been killed in a brutal crackdown with some suggesting the number could be as high as “30,000”.
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