Iran protests: Second execution carried out

Iran has carried out its second public execution linked to the nearly three-month wave of anti-government protests.

Majid Reza Rahnavard was hanged in the city of Mashhad, the country’s judiciary said.

He was convicted of stabbing and killing two members of the security forces.

The first execution linked to the protests took place last Thursday, when Mohsen Shekari was hanged, triggering widespread condemnation.

UK Foreign Secretary James Cleverly warned at the time that the world could not “turn a blind eye to the abhorrent violence committed by the Iranian regime against its own people”.

The current protests were triggered by the death of Mahsa Amini, a 22-year-old woman who was detained by the country’s morality police in September and died while in custody.

The unrest, which began in the capital Tehran where Amini died, has spread to some 160 cities in all of Iran’s 31 provinces.

It is considered one of the most serious challenges to the Islamic Republic since the 1979 revolution.

Agencies