The Islamic Republic of Iran’s president will address the United Nations even as his government silences its citizens with the noose. Masoud Pezeshkian, scheduled to visit New York on September 23 for the UN General Assembly, lectured the world expansively about human rights last year. He spoke about the war in Gaza and human rights in general, with little reference to his own country, which executes the world’s second-largest number of people every year, behind only China.
Under the so-called “reformist” president, executions and crackdowns have only surged. This cruelty targets not only Iranians accused of common crimes, but also those with the wrong politics or religious identity.
It is not enough to focus purely on Iran’s nuclear ambitions. Pezeshkian’s UNGA appearance is an opportunity for the United States and the rest of the world to call out Tehran’s abuses of the Iranian people, engage openly with dissidents, and levy new sanctions on those responsible.
This is especially urgent as repression inside the country has deepened this year, worsening still further since the 12-day war with Israel in June. Pezeshkian’s government executed 975 Iranians in 2024, making it the top state killer per capita, a U.S. State Department report released August 12 said.
That pace has increased this year. From January through August, more than 841 people have been executed by the regime, and more than 21,000 people have been taken into custody since the late-June ceasefire alone.
Once arrested, dissidents are often charged with “waging war against God,” a capital offense. Thirty-one Iranians were executed on political charges in 2024. Though the tally for 2025 still has months to run, evidence suggests a post-war surge. As of early August, 67 political prisoners were on death row, including nine accused of spying for Israel or the United States. Despite a lack of credible evidence, “Israeli spies” made up six of 17 “security-related” executions in June.
Religious minorities, particularly Jews, remain another central target of the theocratic, Shia-supremacist state. “Government officials, including the supreme leader, president, and other top officials, routinely engaged in egregious antisemitic rhetoric and Holocaust denial and distortion,” the State Department report noted.
Since the June 24 ceasefire, Iranian authorities have stepped up arrests of religious minorities under the false pretext of espionage. At least 53 Christians have been detained over alleged ties to Israel’s spy agency, the Mossad. Security forces raided more than a dozen Baha’i homes and detained four whose whereabouts remain unknown. More than two dozen Jews were interrogated, and five are still in custody — including one American accused of having links to Israel.
Other “criminals” include members of teachers’ unions, petroleum industry workers, and bus drivers, all of whom have been arrested for protesting low wages and a lack of benefits. A strike by the Truckers and Drivers Union grew into a week-long protest in May, spanning more than 40 cities nationwide, only to be crushed through arrests and intimidation.
But Tehran’s repression reaches far beyond political and religious targets. Iran’s economy, gutted by sanctions brought on by the regime, has driven many into a world of illicit drugs to make ends meet. It then punishes them with amputations and executions, transforming its own failures into further brutality.
In 2024 alone, the regime carried out 485 drug-related executions, representing 79 percent of all drug-related executions worldwide. At least 343 executions occurred in the first four months of 2025 — a 75 percent increase over the same period in 2024.
The cruelty extends to lesser punishments. More than 148 crimes are punishable by flogging in Iran, and 20 by amputation, the State Department report said. On June 10, two men had their hands amputated in Isfahan Central Prison, and on July 30 authorities in Urmia Prison amputated four fingers from the right hands of three prisoners, all convicted of theft.
Many in Washington are rightly focused on Iran’s nuclear program, but human rights must be part of the conversation. The 12-day war showed the weakness and fallibility of the regime, generating a sense of hope in average Iranians. We cannot let that momentum fade. What is needed is a strategy of maximum support for the Iranian people, alongside maximum pressure against the regime.
That means reaching average Iranians directly with communication campaigns, pairing words with tangible aid for protesters, and ensuring they remain connected to the world with internet access during times of unrest. Support for their human rights is support for the only force that can end the Islamic Republic, something no bombing run can ever do.
Janatan Sayeh is a research analyst at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies focused on Iranian domestic affairs and the Islamic Republic’s regional malign influence.
