Dáil Éireann Debate, Thursday - 22 October 2015
315. Deputy Ruth Coppinger asked the Minister for Foreign Affairs and Trade if he or his Department have raised with the Iranian Embassy or with the Iranian authorities the cases of persons (details supplied) who were executed despite being children when the alleged offences took place; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [37066/15]
View answerIreland, like our EU partners, has a strong and unequivocal opposition to the death penalty at all times and in all circumstances and accordingly seeks its universal abolition. The reports of the execution of persons who committed crimes as minors by the Islamic Republic of Iran are deeply worrying and I echo the comments made by The United Nations Special Rapporteur on Summary Executions, Cristof Heyns, who stated that ‘these are unlawful killings committed by the State, the equivalent of murders performed by individuals…executing a juvenile offender, especially after a questionable trial, directly contravenes the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights and the Convention on the Rights of the Child, to which Iran is a party”.
Ireland regularly raises its grave concerns at the human rights situation in Iran, including particularly the use of the death penalty, with the Iranian Embassy in Dublin and with Iranian officials elsewhere, where appropriate. I repeated these concerns when I met with the Iranian Speaker of the Parliament, Dr Ali Larijani, in Dublin in June.
Amongst our priorities as a member of the UN Human Rights Council is the abolition of the death penalty. Because of our limited resources, we generally find it more practicable to seek to address the matter in principle, rather than try to be active on each individual case.
At the Universal Periodic Review of Iran, at the Human Rights Council in October 2014, Ireland recommended that Iran establish a moratorium on executions with a view to abolishing the death penalty, and guarantee that no individual under the age of 18 at the time of their alleged crime is sentenced to death, in line with its obligations under the Convention on the Rights of the Child.
In March of this year, during the interactive dialogue with the Special Rapporteur on the Situation of Human Rights in the Islamic Republic of Iran, we again voiced our serious concerns as regards to the high number of executions in Iran, and noted in particular the information in the report that the number of reported executions in 2014 was the highest in the past twelve years. We underlined that our concerns over the death penalty are heightened in relation to fair trial standards.
We will continue to call for the end to the death penalty in Iran, including through bilateral contacts with Iran, with our EU partners and at the UN.
