IRAN. PROMISES GIVEN TO EUROPEAN PARLIAMENT TO HALT THE EXECUTION OF MINORS

May 4, 2005: Iran gave written assurances to the European Parliament that it would cease executing people found guilty of crimes committed before their eighteenth birthday.
Iranian diplomats recently contacted MEPs with commitments that some of the Islamic republic’s controversial practices were to be eliminated.
One diplomat told European Voice that a bill prohibiting the execution of minors had been expected to go before the parliament, the Majilis, in April but had been delayed because of the assembly’s heavy workload. But he expected that it would be submitted in the near future. The bill would not allow a death sentence to be carried out in any case where a crime had been committed by someone under 18.
As a signatory of the International Convention on Civil and Political Rights and the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child, Iran is prohibited from executing minors. Nevertheless, 11 juvenile offenders had been executed since 1990. The most recent execution took place on 20 January, when Imam Farokhi was put to death for a crime committed when he was 17.
Simon Coveney, the Irish MEP who drafted Parliament’s latest annual report on human rights in the world, said there now appeared to be an opportunity "for a change of mindset" in Iran.
"I will believe it when I see it. But the very fact that they are talking along these lines is significant," he said.
According to Amnesty International, the Iranian authorities had mooted an end to juvenile executions for more than two years, yet had not yet passed the required legislation.
Joe Stork of Human Rights Watch said: "A moratorium would be a good step. It would be an even better step if legislation made the moratorium permanent."
Iranian diplomats had also given assurances to MEPs that executions by stoning no longer occurred in Iran. (Sources: European Voice, 04/05/2005)