Child Bride Rana Faraj Oghli 42nd Woman Executed in 2025

According to information obtained by Iran Human Rights, a woman was hanged in Tabriz Central Prison on 3 December 2025. Her identity has been established as Rana Faraj Oghli, a 24-year-old Tabriz native who was arrested for the murder of her husband around two years ago. She was sentenced to qisas (retribution-in-kind) for murder by the Criminal Court.

An informed source told IHRNGO: “Rana was 16 when she was forced by her family to marry a man who was 19 years her senior and already had three children. Rana’s family forced her to marry him for his financial means, he had bought a pickup truck for Rana’s dad to work with. Rana had been locked up in a room for two days and night to force her to accept the marriage.”

“Around eight years ago, when Rana was 16, she married the man and around two years ago, she was arrested for his murder. In her own words, those years felt like death for her and what made her reach the point of stabbing him. She didn’t request forgiveness in court and even said that she didn’t want a lawyer, she felt like she’d been freed from a life that was like death,” the source added.

At the time of writing, her execution has not been reported by domestic media or officials in Iran.

Rana Faraj Oghli is the 42nd woman execution recorded in 2025 and the 28th to be hanged for murder charges. This is the highest number of women executions recorded in Iran in more than two decades. Iran executes the highest number of women globally.

In January 2025, IHRNGO published a report titled “Women and the Death Penalty in Iran; a Gendered Perspective,” which sheds light on the contemporary experiences of women facing the death penalty, focusing on the discriminatory laws and societal factors that perpetuate their suffering. 

Those charged with the umbrella term of “intentional murder” are sentenced to qisas (retribution-in-kind) regardless of intent or circumstances due to a lack of grading in law. Once a defendant has been convicted, the victim’s family are required to choose between death as retribution, diya (blood money) or forgiveness.

Crucially, while an indicative amount is set by the Judiciary every year, there is no legal limit to how much can be demanded by families of the victims. IHRNGO has recorded many cases where defendants are executed because they cannot afford to pay the blood money. Should the victim’s family choose execution, they are not only encouraged to attend, but also to physically carry out the execution themselves.

According to IHRNGO’s 2024 Annual Report on the Death Penalty, at least 419 people including a juvenile offender and 19 women, were executed for murder charges, the highest number of qisas executions since 2010. Only 12% of the recorded qisas executions were announced by official sources. In 2024, Iran Human Rights also recorded 649 cases of families choosing diya or forgiveness instead of qisas executions. At least 641 people were executed for murder charges in the first eleven months of 2025.