![Iranian soldiers take part in an annual military drill in the coast of the Gulf of Oman and near the strategic Strait of Hormuz, in Jask, Iran on December 30, 2022 [Iranian Army - Anadolu Agency]](https://i0.wp.com/www.middleeastmonitor.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/12/AA-20221230-29870784-29870772-IRAN_HOLDS_ANNUAL_MILITARY_DRILL_NEAR_STRATEGIC_STRAIT_OF_HORMUZ.jpg?resize=1200%2C800&quality=85&strip=all&zoom=1&ssl=1)
Iranian authorities executed 11 people from the Baluch minority on drug charges within 48 hours, according to a non-governmental organisation, raising concerns that this group has been disproportionately targeted in a wave of executions.
The Norway-based Iran Human Rights (IHR) said nine Iranian Baluchis and two Baluch citizens of neighbouring Afghanistan were executed between Sunday and Tuesday morning.
The organisation added that it documented a total of 61 executions across Iran in July, at a time when Tehran is intensifying the issuance of this punishment, with 423 executions carried out this year.
Activists accuse Iran of using the death penalty as a tool to spread fear among the population, in the wake of a protest movement that erupted last September following the death of 22-year-old Mahsa Amini while in police custody.
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The human rights organisation said that while the Baluch minority, who are Sunni Muslims, represent only two to six per cent of the population, they made up a third of the executions in 2022.
The IHR added that eight Baluch men were executed on drug related charges in Zahedan prison, the capital of Sistan-Baluchistan province, between 30 July and 1 August.
Another Baluch man was executed on similar charges on 31 July in a prison in Birjand, Khorasan Province.
Mahammad Arbab, 30, and Asadollah Amini, 32, were both Baluch Afghans secretly executed in Sistan-Baluchistan on 30 and 31 July, according to the organisation.
The IHR said that half of the 256 people executed on drug charges in 2022 were members of the Baluch minority.
According to Amnesty International, Iran ranks second in the world, after China, in terms of the number of executions.
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