Iran murders 15 drug offenders

Iran hanged 21 prisoners on March 4th — 15 for drug offenses, 6 for alleged hostility to God.
The names of the six Sunni Kurds hanged for political reasons were released. The names of the drug offenders were not. However, the Iran Human Rights Documentation Center released a rare photo of one of the men who was executed.
Worldwide, the pace of executions of non-violent drug offenders in Iran and elsewhere appears to be running high, although precise numbers aren’t known.
Indonesia is preparing a firing squad execution of nine drug offenders — two Australians, a French man, a Filipino woman, three Nigerians, a Brazilian, and an Indonesian — part of a bloody campaign launched last year by President Joko Widodo.
Saudi Arabia continues to behead drug offenders, about two dozen in the first two months of 2015, including Omar Mohammed Abdul Muti al-Rubai of Jordan for amphetamines.
In Iran, executions have increased under supposedly moderate President Hassan Rouhani. Iran is known to have hanged 67 drug offenders in the first two months of 2015, so the latest 15 executions would bring that number to at 82 through March 4.
Two-thirds of Iran’s executions are for drug offenses. Iran executed at least 721 people last year and 220 this year through March 9.
Iran sometimes gives only initials of drug offenders murdered by the government. It also sometimes releases doomed drug prisoners if they can recite the Quran from memory.