“Ten protesters hanged in forty-two days. He was the tenth.”
- Age
- 21
- Arrested
- January 2026 protests, Isfahan
- Executed
- 30 April 2026, Dastgerd Prison, Isfahan
- Context
- Tenth protester executed within 42 days
- Aftermath
- Funeral under security cordon; ten relatives admitted
- Reported
- Iran Human Rights, 30 April 2026
Who was Sasan Azadvar Jonaqani?
Sasan Azadvar Jonaqani was twenty-one, from Isfahan, and was arrested during the January 2026 protests in the city. He was hanged at Dastgerd Prison on 30 April 2026.
Iran Human Rights recorded him as the tenth protester executed in forty-two days, the sharpest concentration of protest executions since 1988. His funeral was held under a security cordon with only ten relatives admitted — a controlled burial of the kind the state has imposed on every high-profile protest execution since Navid Afkari’s in 2020.
How the Islamic Republic executes protesters
Protest executions in Iran follow a fixed sequence: arrest during or shortly after a demonstration; weeks of incommunicado detention; a confession broadcast on state television; a Revolutionary Court hearing lasting hours rather than days, usually without counsel of the defendant’s choosing; a moharebeh or efsad-fel-arz conviction; a rejected appeal; and a dawn hanging announced afterwards by the judiciary’s own news agency.
None of that survives contact with the fair-trial guarantees of Article 14 of the ICCPR, which Iran ratified in 1975. The UN Special Rapporteur on Iran and the UN Fact-Finding Mission have both concluded that executions arising from protest cases amount to arbitrary deprivation of life, and that when carried out as part of a widespread and systematic attack on civilians they constitute crimes against humanity. Sasan Azadvar Jonaqani’s case followed the sequence exactly.
Video and archive
No verified video of Sasan Azadvar Jonaqani is in the public record that this project can confirm. The film below documents the events in which he was killed, and the Javidnaman archive holds the family photographs and case notes for the January 2026 dead.
Iran’s mass graves and the destruction of evidence. More documentary footage is collected on the videos page.
Sources
- Iran Human Rights, 30 April 2026
- Iran Human Rights (IHRNGO)
- HRANA — Human Rights Activists News Agency
- Sources and methodology on this site
Why this page exists
Names surface for a few days and then disappear under the next news cycle. This page keeps a dated, citation-ready record of what is known about Sasan Azadvar Jonaqani, with the photograph his family chose to release and links to the monitors who verify such cases. Corrections and additional documentation are welcome through the organisations listed under sources and methodology.
Frequently asked questions
Who was Sasan Azadvar Jonaqani?
Sasan Azadvar Jonaqani, 21, was arrested during the January 2026 Isfahan protests and hanged at Dastgerd Prison on 30 April 2026 — the tenth protester executed within 42 days.
When was Sasan Azadvar Jonaqani executed?
Sasan Azadvar Jonaqani was executed on 30 April 2026.
What was Sasan Azadvar Jonaqani charged with?
Protest executions in Iran are almost always brought under moharebeh ("waging war against God") or efsad-fel-arz ("corruption on earth"), capital charges decided by Revolutionary Courts in closed sessions that fall far short of the fair-trial standards of Article 14 of the ICCPR.
Are protest executions in Iran lawful?
No. The UN Special Rapporteur on Iran and the UN Fact-Finding Mission have found that death sentences imposed after coerced confessions and closed proceedings amount to arbitrary deprivation of life, and that the practice, applied systematically against protesters, can constitute a crime against humanity.
Related pages
- Amirhossein Hatami — another biography from the same period.
- The Two Nights — 8–9 January 2026 in detail.
- The protest record · Faces · Victims database
- All memorial biographies · In Memoriam
