The Presidency of the European Union condemns the execution of 24 persons in the city of Karaj in Iran on 30 July 2009. The Presidency is concerned about the continued large-scale use of the death penalty in Iran, including the repeated incidence of collective executions during the past month.
The Presidency recalls the EU’s longstanding opposition to the death penalty in all circumstances and recalls that any miscarriage or failure of justice in the application of capital punishment represents the irreparable and irreversible loss of human life.
The Presidency continues to call on the Iranian authorities to abolish the death penalty completely and, in the meantime, to establish a moratorium on executions as urged by United Nations General Assembly resolutions 62/149 and 63/168.