Analytical Report on the Extrajudicial Killing of 153 Identified Children and Adolescents during the January 2026 Uprising
HRM Feb 4, 2026
The nationwide uprising of January 2026 in Iran marks a dark turning point in the history of human rights violations, characterized not only by the scale of the protests but also by the unprecedented brutality of suppressive forces against the most vulnerable segments of society. This report provides a legal and statistical analysis of the killing of children and adolescents under the age of 18—a crime whose documentation reveals a “systematic pattern” for the physical elimination of protesters, regardless of age.
The Political Context of the Crime: Legitimizing State Violence
Ali Khamenei and high-ranking regime officials utilized hostile rhetoric, labeling protesters as “agents of a coup,” “terrorists,” and “mercenaries of the enemy.” This deliberate labeling aimed to strip citizens of their legal protections and provide implicit authorization for the “elimination of dissidents.” When the highest political authority of a country characterizes the protests of adolescents and students as “hybrid warfare,” it effectively grants field forces carte blanche to exercise lethal violence against children. Within this security paradigm, even a three-year-old child or an infant is perceived not as an innocent citizen, but as part of a “subversive project,” thereby rendering the deprivation of their right to life as “legitimate.”
Field Analysis of the Causes of Death: Intentional Lethal Force
Based on human rights documentation and medical reports, the circumstances surrounding the deaths of these children indicate the use of “unnecessary lethal force.” The patterns of child fatalities during this uprising include:
- Direct Fire to Vital Organs: Contrary to official claims, the majority of adolescents died from single gunshot wounds to the forehead, heart, or neck, indicating targeted fire by snipers.
- Brutal Physical Assaults (Batons): Numerous cases of death due to “cerebral hemorrhage” resulting from repeated blows with hard objects to the skull during detention or at the protest scene have been reported.
- Indiscriminate Fire in Residential Areas: The deaths of children such as Adrina Ghorbani (infant) and Bahar Hosseini (3 years old) demonstrate the reckless use of toxic tear gas and indiscriminate firing in residential neighborhoods.
Statistics and the Scope of the Crime
Out of approximately 2,300 victims whose identities have been verified thus far, the names of 153 children and adolescents have been recorded. It should be noted that due to the lack of age-related information for almost half of the 2,300 individuals listed, these statistics represent only the “minimum” extent of the crime, and the actual figures are estimated to be significantly higher. These statistics reveal a harrowing reality: approximately 10% (one-tenth) of all individuals documented as killed by the Iranian regime were children.
Violations of International Conventions
These actions constitute a flagrant violation of the following international treaties to which Iran is a signatory:
- Convention on the Rights of the Child (Article 6): Violation of the inherent right to life and the failure to protect children during civil unrest.
- International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR): Arbitrary deprivation of life and extrajudicial killings.
- The Rome Statute: The systematic nature of these killings places them within the category of “crimes against humanity.”
Immediate Mandates
The killing of children in January 2026 transcends mere police crackdowns; it is a “state-sponsored campaign to intimidate society” by targeting its children. The international community must not settle for verbal condemnations. Referring the case to the International Criminal Court (ICC) and identifying the perpetrators and architects of this “state-sponsored killing of minors” as war criminals is the minimum requirement for justice.