PARIS | Iranian authorities said on Friday that Mahsa Amini’s death was not caused by ‘beatings’, but by the aftermath of an illness, three weeks after protests sparked by the young woman’s death in custody began. .
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Arrested on September 13 by the morality police in Tehran for not respecting the strict dress code for women in Iran, this 22-year-old Iranian Kurd died three days later in hospital.
Activists claimed she suffered a head injury while in detention. The Iranian authorities have denied any physical contact between the police and the young woman and said they are awaiting the results of the investigation.
His death sparked a protest movement in the country, with Iranian women in the front line, as well as solidarity rallies around the world.
The demonstrations, the largest since those of 2019 against the rise in the price of gasoline, were strongly repressed. At least 92 people have been killed since September 16, according to the Oslo-based NGO Iran Human Rights (IHR), while an official report puts around 60 dead, including 12 members of the security forces.
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‘Mahsa Amini’s death was not caused by beatings to the head and vital organs’ but was linked to ‘brain tumor surgery at the age of 8’, a report said of the Iranian Forensic Organization, while her father Amjad Amini had indicated that his daughter was “in perfect health”.
“On September 13, (Mahsa Amini) suddenly lost consciousness and collapsed (…). Despite being transferred to hospital and the efforts of medical personnel, she died on September 16 from multiple organ failure caused by cerebral hypoxia,” added the report released by state television.
“Impunity”
Some countries have imposed economic sanctions, such as the United States which announced measures on Thursday targeting seven senior Iranian officials, including the Minister of the Interior, Ahmad Vahidi, “key instrument of the regime in the repression”, and that of Communications , Issa Zarépour, “responsible for the shameful attempt to block the internet”.
In a letter to President Joe Biden on Thursday, some 20 NGOs urge him to “do more” to “prevent further state violence and respond to a long history of atrocities and impunity in this country”.
According to these organizations, most of which are Iranian, thousands of people including journalists, activists and artists have been arrested since the beginning of the movement.
According to Amnesty International, at least 52 people were killed by security forces. The organization, which has documented numerous cases of torture and sexual assault, believes that the “real toll could be much higher”.
Death of a teenager
In the Islamic Republic, the strict dress code obliges women to wear the Islamic veil in particular. In recent days, the mobilization has gone so far as to win over schoolgirls who have gathered and removed their veils or shouted anti-government slogans.
Iranian Attorney General Mohammad Jafar Montazeri acknowledged that young people were involved in the protests, denouncing the influence of social networks, on which the authorities have imposed severe access restrictions since mid-September.
On Thursday, the Iranian justice denied that a 16-year-old girl, Sarina Ismaïlzadeh, had been killed in the province of Alborz (north-west) by the security forces, affirming that she had “committed suicide by jumping from ‘a building”.
IHR reported on Friday that Sarina’s family had come under enormous pressure from government agents to “force her to repeat the official version of suicide.”
According to the NGO, when the family went to identify the body, “multiple injuries were clearly visible on his face, and the right side of his forehead was completely crushed due to the force of the beatings”.
Tehran has accused outside forces of stoking the protests, including the United States, its sworn enemy.