Iran pursued a campaign of violence and intimidation against its own people in 2010, committing extrajudicial killings and using amputation and flogging as punishments, according to a State Department report released today.
The 35th annual human rights report, which covers 194 countries, documents in a detailed 69-page chapter the torture, beatings, rape and group executions carried out by Iran’s security forces.
“We have multiple reports that the government summarily executed more than 300 people in 2010,” Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said today. She cited the case of four Kurdish men who were arrested for human rights advocacy and hung in May. “They were reported to have confessed to terrorism under torture,” Clinton said.
The U.S. has no embassy in Iran and relied heavily on non- U.S. government sources, according to a footnote. Switzerland represents U.S. interests in Iran.
