Human Rights Watch appeals to Iran to prevent imminent executions by stoning

Human Rights Watch has appealed to the head of Iran’s Judiciary to revoke the decision to sentence three people to death by stoning. In separate cases, two sisters from the town of Shahriar in Tehran Province and a man from the town of Sari in the province of Mazandaran have been found guilty of adultery, HRW reported Wednesday.

According to the rights group’s press release, the sentences have already been approved by the Supreme Court, meaning that only intervention by the country’s highest judicial official, Ayatollah Mahmud Hashemi Shahrudi, can prevent the stoning from being carried out.

Human rights activists within Iran are defying pressure from the government in continuing a ‘Stop Stoning Forever’ campaign, but the practice continues.

“The Iranian government is set to execute three of its citizens in a horrendously brutal manner,” said Joe Stork, deputy Middle East director at Human Rights Watch. “The Judiciary must act now to end this inhuman form of punishment once and for all.”

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