URGENT: JUVENILE EXECUTION SCHEDULED IN FEW HOURS IN IRAN

In 2002, Mohammad Reza Haddadi (born in 1987) was arrested for allegedly stealing a car and murdering a man with the help of two older boys. He confessed to the murder, but retracted the confession during his trial, saying he had claimed responsibility for the killing only because his two co-defendants had offered to give his family money if he did so. During the trial he said that he had not taken part in the murder. His co-defendants later supported Mohammad Reza Haddadi's claims of innocence and withdrew their testimony that had implicated him. They were both over the age of 18 at the time of the crime and received prison sentences. Mohammad Reza Haddadi’s death sentence was confirmed by the Supreme Court in July 2005.

IHR calls for the international community to call for an immediate halt to Mohammad Reza’s execution. Despite ratifying the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child, Iran is one of the few countries in the world which carries out death sentence for juvenile offenders.