Iran executed two men on Saturday having accused them of killing a member of the security forces during nationwide protests that followed the death of Mahsa Amini.
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"Mohammad Mehdi Karami and Seyyed Mohammad Hosseini, principal perpetrators of the crime that led to the unjust martyrdom of Ruhollah Ajamian [a member of the Basij paramilitary force militia] were hanged this morning," the judiciary said in a statement carried by the official IRNA news agency.
Three others have been sentenced to death in the same case, while 11 received prison sentences. The latest executions bring to four the number of protesters officially known to have been executed in the aftermath of the unrest.
The execution was condemned by the European Union, United States and other Western nations. The EU called on Iran to immediately stop carrying out death sentences against protestors, and annul existing sentences.
"This is yet another sign of the Iranian authorities' violent repression of civilian demonstrations," High Representative of the European Union for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy Josep Borrell said in a statement.
US special envoy to Iran Robert Malley said the executions took place following "sham trials," and wrote on Twitter that "these executions must stop."
British Foreign Minister James Cleverly too urged Iran to "immediately end the violence against its own people."
The French foreign ministry called the executions "revolting" and urged Iranian authorities to heed the "legitimate aspirations of the Iranian people."
The Netherlands said it would summon Iran's ambassador to Amsterdam for the second time in a month to raise its concerns over the execution of demonstrators, and urged other EU countries to do the same.
Amnesty International said last month that Iranian authorities are seeking the death penalty for at least 26 others in what it called "sham trials designed to intimidate protesters".
It said all of those facing death sentences had been denied the right to adequate defence and access to lawyers of their choosing. Rights groups say defendants have instead had to rely on state-appointed attorneys who do little to defend them.
Amnesty said the court that convicted Karami, a 22-year-old karate champion, relied on forced confessions.
Hosseini's lawyer Ali Sharifzadeh Ardakani said in a Dec. 18 tweet that the former had been severely tortured and that confessions extracted under torture had no legal basis.
He said Hosseini was beaten with his hands and feet tied up, kicked in the head until he passed out, and subjected to electric shocks on different parts of his body.
Iran denies that confessions are extracted under torture.
The hijab protests represent one of the biggest challenges to the Islamic Republic since its establishment in 1979. Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei on Saturday named hardline police official Ahmad Reza Radan as the new national police commander, state media reported.
Radan, who was placed under US sanctions in 2010 for human rights violations, has frequently called for strict enforcement of the country's Islamic dress code for women during his earlier police positions.
The Basij force, affiliated with Iran's powerful Revolutionary Guards, has been behind much of the crackdown against protesters.
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Iran, which has blamed the unrest on its foreign foes including the United States, sees its crackdown of protests as preserving national sovereignty.
The rights group HRANA said that as of Friday, 517 protesters had been killed during unrest, including 70 minors. It said 68 members of the security forces had also been killed.
As many as 19,262 protesters are believed to have been arrested, it said. Iranian officials have said that up to 300 people, including members of the security forces, have died.
The first protester known to be executed was 23-year-old Mohsen Shekari on Dec. 8, less than three months after his arrest. He was accused of burning a trash bin, blocking a road, stabbing a member of the Basij militia with a machete and undermining public safety.
Majid Reza Rahnavard, 23, was hanged from a crane in public on Dec. 12 in the northeastern city of Mashhad, less than a month after his arrest. He was accused of stabbing to death two Basij members and wounding four other people in Mashhad.
