Status: 10/17/2022 4:24 p.m
In Iran, emergency services continue to use brutal force against demonstrators. Nevertheless, the protests continue after Mahsa Amini’s death – including in the center of the country. So far there have been more than 120 deaths.
There have been renewed protests in Iran. Anti-government protesters took to the streets in Yazd in the center of the country and in several other cities, including Piranshahr, northwest of Tehran. A video of people setting fire to tires and calling for the death of supreme spiritual leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei was posted on the widely subscribed Tasvir1500 Twitter account. The authenticity of the recordings cannot be verified.
According to the Reuters news agency, the security forces are concentrating their operations against government critics in north-western Iran, where most of the country’s ten million Kurds live. However, the protests have spread to other minorities in other parts of the country. They caught fire after the death of the young Kurd Mahsa Amini, who died a month ago. The so-called vice police had arrested her on charges of not wearing her headscarf properly.
More than 120 protesters killed
Since then, the Iranian regime has been acting with all severity against the mostly young demonstrating women and men. The human rights organization Iran Human Rights (IHR), based in Oslo, puts the number of demonstrators killed so far in connection with Amini at 122. She had previously spoken of at least 108 dead. According to IHR, 93 other people were killed in violent clashes lasting several days in the city of Sahedan in the province of Sistan-Baluchistan. They began on September 30 after a young girl was allegedly raped by a police officer. At least 27 children are among the dead.
Despite the deployment of the feared Basij militias and voluntary military units, the government has so far not been able to contain the protests that have been going on for weeks. The elite Revolutionary Guards have not yet been used against the demonstrators. However, they have started manoeuvres.
Eight dead in prison fire
The death toll after the fire in Ewin prison in Tehran, where numerous political prisoners are being held, has risen to eight. As the Iranian judiciary announced on its website Misan Online, four other prisoners died in the hospital. On Sunday, the Iranian judiciary initially reported four dead and 61 injured, including four seriously injured.
Human rights organizations fear an even higher number of victims. IHR rejected the figure given by the authorities, citing the “long history of concealing facts” in the Islamic Republic. The organization said it had received reports that “special forces were deployed at Ewin Prison to incite prisoners and create the grounds for a crackdown”. She called for an international investigation supported by the United Nations to clarify what was happening.