An Iranian drug smuggler survived a botched hanging last week—and authorities are nursing him back to health in order to repeat the execution.
The family of Alireza M. found him alive in the morgue, a day after he was left to hang for 12 minutes and declared dead.
In a statement Thursday, Amnesty International called on Iran to call off the execution.
“The horrific prospect of this man facing a second hanging, after having gone through the whole ordeal already once, merely underlines the cruelty and inhumanity of the death penalty,” Philip Luther, director of Amnesty International’s Middle East and North Africa Program, said in the statement.
Iran executes more people than any other country except China, including at least 508 people so far this year, mostly for drug offenses, according to Amnesty International.
[BBC]