(Paris) New demonstrations took place on Sunday in universities in Iran and Kurdish regions in the north-west of the country, the protest movement against the regime showing no sign of respite despite the repression.
Posted at 11:49
Updated at 12:53 p.m.
Protests sparked by the death of young Iranian Kurd Mahsa Amini on September 16 after her arrest by vice squads have become the largest wave of protests in the country since the 1979 Islamic Revolution.
Over the days, protests for women’s freedom have turned into a movement against the Islamic regime, taking to the streets, universities and even schools, despite a crackdown whose death toll is approaching 200, according to the count of an NGO based outside Iran.
Women are mounted in the front line, bareheaded, burning their veils.
According to the Norwegian-based Iranian Kurdish rights group Hengaw, security forces opened fire in the Kurdistan town of Marivan on Sunday, injuring 35 people. This assessment could not be confirmed immediately.
Protesters had gathered after the death in Tehran of a Kurdish student from Marivan, Nasrin Ghadri, who Hengaw said died on Saturday after being hit in the head by police.
These facts have not been confirmed by the Iranian authorities.
A large majority of the 290 Iranian deputies demanded on Sunday that justice apply the law of retaliation against the “enemies of God” in reference to the authors of the “riots” which have shaken the country for several weeks.
In a press release signed by 227 of the 290 deputies, they ask all the leaders of the country, including the judiciary, to apply the law of retaliation as soon as possible against the moharebs (enemy of God).
“Like the Islamic State group, they have damaged the lives and property of people with knives and firearms,” added these parliamentarians in a text published by Icana, the agency of the Iranian Parliament.
“We call on the judiciary to deal decisively with the perpetrators of these crimes and all those who incited the riots, including some politicians,” they said.
Tensions in Kurdistan
According to Hengaw, the girl was unceremoniously buried at dawn at the insistence of authorities, who feared protests and later sent reinforcements to the scene.
The situation in Kurdistan is particularly tense since the death of Masha Amini, who was from the city of Saghez, located in this province.
The 22-year-old died three days after she was arrested in Tehran, where she was visiting, by morality police who accused her of breaking the Islamic Republic’s strict dress code, requiring women to wear the veil in public.
Universities have become one of the main centers of protest. According to the Norway-based NGO Iran Human Rights (IHR), students at Sharif University in Tehran staged sit-ins on Sunday in support of other arrested students.
At Babol University in northeastern Iran, students dismantled barriers that by law separate men and women in the cafeteria, according to IHR.
The crackdown on protests has killed at least 186 people since September, according to a report published Saturday by IHR.
According to this group, 118 people were also killed in another protest movement in Zahedan, Sistan-Baluchistan, triggered on September 30 after the alleged rape of a young girl by a police officer.
This poor region of southeastern Iran is populated by the Baloch minority, mostly adhering to Sunni Islam and not the dominant Shiism in Iran, and feeling discriminated against.
In a new outbreak of violence in this province, security forces fired on protesters in Khach, near Zahedan, on Friday, NGOs said.
Ten people may have been killed and dozens more injured, according to Amnesty International, which accused security forces of firing at protesters from rooftops.
IHR put the number of people shot dead in Khach after Friday prayers at 16.
‘More violence’
“Iranians continue to take to the streets and are more determined than ever to bring about fundamental change,” said the director of this NGO, Mahmood Amiry-Moghaddam. “The Islamic Republic’s response is more violence,” he added.
Thousands of people have been arrested across Iran since the start of the movement, including journalists, lawyers, activists and celebrities, according to NGOs.
According to IHR, “dozens” of arrested protesters have been charged with crimes that carry the death penalty.
The fate of Hossein Ronaghi, an activist for freedom of expression and contributor to the wall street journalarrested in September, is causing concern in particular, his family having announced that he was observing a hunger strike in Evin prison in Tehran.
The activist’s father, Ahmad, was in intensive care after suffering a heart attack during a vigil near the prison, Hossein Ronaghi’s brother Hassan announced on Twitter.