The Age of Criminal Responsibility of Minors in Domestic and International Laws

In after revolution penal law, especially Islamic penal code (note 1 from article 49), contrary to previous legislations, "religious puberty" age is determined as criminal age limit. In practice, penal authorities without producing a definition for the term "religious puberty", considere it equal to concepts inserted in civil code conforming to "sexual puberty" especially note 1 of article 1210 of that act. According to which, females of nine years old and males of fifhteen years old are considered criminally liable and punishable simillar to adults. But, in most of national legislations, principally minors under 18 years old have not criminal responsibility and if they commit a crime they are only expose to protective or correctional measures and other alternative actions that focus on rehabilitation of the minors. So, international human rights instruments such as infant convention and etc, have forbidden for minors under 18 years old using death and imprisonment penalties which are opposed to human right’s and have a negative impact on losing party. Also, in this provisions for the minimum threshold, it can not allowed the judiciary intervention and the application of sanction’s. Our evaluation shows Iran criminal policy about juveniles delinquent is contrary not only to international legislations and legislations of most countries of the world but also to all scientific criminal principles and rules from criminal sciences view point, especially criminology and psychology. Thus, present study tries to express through a comparative survey and analysis as far as possible the relevent short comings and the appropriate solutions.