Sadrullah Fazeli Zarei and Yusuf Mehrdad were found guilty of "insulting the Prophet Muhammad and other blasphemy, including burning the Qur'an". They were hanged on Monday morning, according to Mizan Online, a news agency affiliated with the judicial branch.

According to the news, in March 2021, one of the defendants confessed to sharing the insults on social media.

Human rights organizations state that “confessions” are often obtained through torture in Iran, where there is no fair trial and many detainees can be sentenced to death within only a few minutes of show trial.

According to many non-governmental organizations, including Amnesty International, Iran has the highest number of executions in the world outside of China.

Iran's Human Rights Organization (IHR) and two non-governmental organizations headquartered in Paris, ECPM, announced that the number of people executed in 2022 increased by 75 percent compared to the previous year.

According to the report, at least 333 people were executed in Iran in 2021, while at least 582 people were executed in 2022.