Iran says it hanged two men over protest-related charges

Iran's judiciary said two men were hanged on Sunday over charges linked to anti-government protests that began over economic grievances and peaked in January.

The judiciary named the men as Erfan Esfandiari and Gol-Mohammad Mohammadi. It said they were found guilty in the central city of Isfahan of tying police officers to a road sign with ropes, injuring them with stones, pouring gasoline on them and setting them on fire.

According to the indictment, the two men filmed the killing scene and sent the footage to television channels abroad. The judiciary statement did not specify when the men were arrested or tried, and did not give their ages.

The protest movement began in late December over the high cost of living and grew into wider anti-government demonstrations that peaked on January 8 and 9. Iranian authorities reported more than 3,000 deaths and attributed the violence to what they called terrorist acts orchestrated by the United States and Israel. Foreign-based NGOs say security forces fired on protesters.

The source said US President Donald Trump had threatened at the time to intervene militarily in Iran, before the United States and Israel launched a joint attack on the country on February 28, triggering the Middle East war. It said arrests and executions have since increased in Iran in connection with both the conflict and the earlier protests.

Iranian authorities executed at least 1,639 people in 2025, the highest annual figure since 1989, according to Iran Human Rights and Together Against the Death Penalty. Amnesty International says Iran carries out the second highest number of executions in the world, after China.