''Statements by Iranian judges serve to highlight the growing tendency towards violent punishments. A few days ago, Ebrahim Raisi, Iran's deputy judiciary chief praised the recent amputation of a thief's hand as a “divine punishment” and “source of pride.”''
Reports of secret hangings and mass executions in Iranian prisons raised concerns among human rights groups about undeclared abuses committed in the world’s second biggest executioner after China. The International Campaign for Human Rights in Iran (ICHRI), an NGO based in New York and the Netherlands, sounded alarm bells over undeclared executions, many taking place in groups, carried out at the Vakilabad Prison in the eastern city of Mashhad, the UAE daily The National reported Sunday.According to the ICHRI’s statement, based on the testimony of former prison inmates, prisoners are in many cases executed in groups and the last mass execution took place on October 12 when ten prisoners were executed together. A former inmate told the ICHRI that he was witness to 46 executions in one day in October 2009.According to Ahmad Ghabel, a religious scholar who spent three months at Vakilabad Prison earlier this year, at least 50 executions took place during his detention.
http://www.alarabiya.net/articles/2010/10/31/124378.html