UN experts and 400 prominent women have urged Iran not to execute Zahra Tabari, a 67-year-old electrical engineer and women's rights activist.
Ms Tabari was arrested in April and accused of collaborating with a banned opposition group, the People's Mujahideen Organisation of Iran (PMOI), according to her family.
In October, she was convicted of 'armed rebellion' by a Revolutionary Court in Rasht after a trial via video link that lasted less than 10 minutes. Her family said the verdict was based on extremely limited and unreliable evidence: a piece of cloth bearing the words 'Woman, Resistance, Freedom', and an unpublished audio message.
Iranian authorities have not yet commented on the case.
At least 51 other people are known to be facing the death penalty in Iran after being convicted of national security offences including armed rebellion, as well as 'enmity against God', 'corruption on Earth' and espionage, according to the UN experts.
The UN Human Rights Council's special rapporteurs on human rights in Iran, violence against women and arbitrary executions, as well as the five members of the working group on discrimination against women and girls, warned in a joint statement that Ms Tabari's case showed a pattern of serious violations of international human rights law.
She was arrested during a raid on her home without a judicial warrant, interrogated in solitary confinement, and pressured to confess to taking up arms against the state. Experts pointed out that she was denied access to a lawyer of her choosing, represented only by a court-appointed lawyer.
The experts stated that the brief trial and insufficient evidence rendered the conviction unsafe, emphasizing that executing Tabari would be an arbitrary act and a grave form of gender discrimination.
In a powerful public appeal led by Justice for the Victims of the 1988 Massacre in Iran, more than 400 individuals, including Nobel laureates and former presidents, called for her immediate release, highlighting the dire state of women's rights in Iran where such activism could lead to death.
Another Iranian woman, Pakhshan Azizi, is also facing a similar sentence. UN experts have indicated that her sentencing appears solely based on her legitimate work as a social worker, including her support for refugees in Iraq and Syria.
According to Iran Human Rights (IHR), at least 1,426 individuals were executed in Iran in the first 11 months of 2025, marking a sharp increase from previous years.
