Mizan News Agency, the judiciary’s official outlet, reported that during the Forty-Day War, 10 individuals were executed for allegedly spying for “Mossad and the CIA.”

The report further emphasized that an additional 29 individuals were executed on charges of being “ringleaders of espionage, terrorism, and armed riots,” The Caspian Post reports, citing IranWire.

The actual number of political executions carried out during the war and postwar periods exceeds the names officially released by the judiciary. According to that report, IranWire sources confirmed the underreporting of political executions, adding that state media, particularly Mizan, frequently record incorrect execution dates in their announcements.

The release of this official report comes as the implementation rate of death sentences in Iran has drawn increased scrutiny from media outlets and human rights organizations in recent months. Human rights activists and several international bodies have sounded the alarm over what they describe as a “worrying surge in executions” in Iran, calling for an immediate halt to or review of these sentences.

In this regard, human rights organizations, including Amnesty International, alongside UN-affiliated bodies, have repeatedly expressed grave concerns over the judicial procedures in security-related cases and the scale of capital punishment in Iran. According to these organizations, the lack of transparency in trial proceedings and the failure to adhere to fair trial standards remain key points of criticism.

In contrast, Iranian judicial officials have consistently maintained that the issued sentences are carried out in strict accordance with domestic laws and within the framework of proper judicial review.

Nevertheless, the alignment of this spike in executions with recent political and security developments has once again turned the issue into a highly contentious topic both domestically and internationally.