We have been informed that the Iranian authorities have executed Reyhaneh Jabbari in the city of Karaj this morning. Ms Jabbari’s mother, Shole Pakravan, confirmed her death to BBC Persian. According to The Independent newspaper, Ms Pakravan told BBC Persian that her 26-year-old daughter was hanged in a Tehran prison and that she was due to see her daughter’s body at the cemetery today. Reyhaneh Jabbari was arrested in 2007 for the murder of a former employee of Iran’s ministry of intelligence, Morteza Abdolali Sarbandi, whom she said had tried to sexually assault her. However, Ms Jabbari emphasised that another man, who was present at the scene, killed Sarbandi. Reyhaneh Jabbari was sentenced to death by a criminal court in Tehran in 2009 following a “deeply flawed investigation and trial” according to Amnesty International. The human rights group further reports that Iran’s judicial authorities pressured Reyhaneh Jabbari to replace her lawyer, Mohammad Ali Jedari Foroughi, for a more inexperienced one, in an apparent attempt to prevent an investigation of her claims. This is a practice which has also widely applied in other trials, as documented by the U.N. Special Rapporteur on the situation of human rights in Iran. Despite international outcry and online petitions signed by hundreds of thousands urging for the suspension of Ms Jabbari’s death sentence, the Iranian authorities nevertheless upheld and carried out the verdict following their charade of justice. Middle East Forum for Development strongly condemns the execution of Reyhaneh Jabbari and calls for an immediate suspension of the death penalty, with a view to abolishing this brutal and inhumane practice.