The Iranian government has always been questioned in international forums due to the high number of executions carried out within the country. The response from Iranian officials has always been that religious laws prevent the reconsideration of the death penalty in criminal laws. However, this response has never been convincing for questioners and critics, as their references are precisely those cases of carrying out the death penalty that have no connection to religious laws.

The punishment for taking a life in Iran has three forms: “qisas” (retribution), “ta’zir execution” (punishment by execution), and “hadd qatl” (death penalty) (such as killing a perpetrator of sodomy, or stoning an adulterer, or killing a thief whose theft falls under the category of hadd qatl in the third degree, etc.). Although the result of all three forms ultimately leads to an unnatural death for the convicted, if international human rights organizations and activists insist on the implementation of the first and third forms by the Iranian government with conditions and reservations – or at least understand to some extent – in regards to the second form, ta’zir execution, which specifically applies to drug trafficking crimes, they emphasize that there are no longer any legal necessities or justifications and that the origin of this punishment is solely a social contract unrelated to Sharia law.

The Iranian government has recently presented a bill to the parliament to remove the death penalty for drug-related crimes. Members of parliament, including one of the members of the judicial commission who are expected to review the bill, have given the green light to the government with their statements. However, many members of parliament, judicial and law enforcement officials, and criminology professors have expressed concerns about the removal of the death penalty before implementing a mechanism to reduce the impact of this major removal on the increase of organized drug trafficking crimes. Although the outcome of the discussions so far has not been to insist on the necessity of keeping the death penalty (since the discussion of removing the death penalty for drug trafficking crimes), it is without a doubt that these concerns are worth considering and should not be rushed, and the potential consequences of this major removal should be carefully thought about.

However, it cannot be overlooked that the implementation of the death penalty from the beginning of the revolution until now has had a significant impact on reducing the profitability of death merchants.

Without a doubt, reviewing the penal laws related to drugs and abolishing the death penalty in the Islamic Republic of Iran will greatly assist in bringing the country closer to international human rights standards. Surely, Iran’s position as the second highest executor of the death penalty will decrease. However, there are whispers in the Iranian parliament that initially, the death penalty will be abolished for individual drug smugglers, while it will still remain for organized crime groups involved in drug trafficking.

It must be noted that abolishing the death penalty for drug offenders increases the value of Iran in terms of human rights, but removing this penalty at any cost is not necessarily in the best interest.