AFP, Tehran, Feb 27, 2010  – Iran has hanged five men convicted of drug trafficking and three found guilty of murdering policemen, reports said on Saturday.
Five armed drug traffickers were hanged inside a prison in the southern city of Kerman, Iran’s ISNA news agency reported without elaborating when the executions were carried out.
In a separate report, the official IRNA news agency said that three men convicted of killing several policemen were hanged in the eastern city of Birjand.
The three were put to death in front of the families of the slain policemen, the news agency said, without specifying whether the executions were carried out inside a prison or in a public place.
The latest hangings bring to at least 25 the number of people executed in Iran so far this year, according to an AFP count based on news reports. Last year, at least 270 people were hanged in the Islamic republic.
Tehran says the death penalty is essential to maintain public security and applied only after exhaustive judicial proceedings. Murder, rape, armed robbery, drug trafficking and adultery are all punishable by death in Iran