Anti-government protests have erupted in Tehran and other cities for a 10th night over the death of a young Iranian woman after a reported beating at the hands of morality police, despite official warnings that an already deadly crackdown would toughen.
The simmering anger over 22-year-old Mahsa Amini’s death this month has also sparked demonstrations outside Iranian embassies around the world, including in Paris, where French police used tear gas and anti-riot tactics to thwart a march by hundreds of people on Iran’s diplomatic compound.
In Iran’s capital, students gathered at Tehran University late on September 25 to chant slogans including “Freedom, freedom, freedom!” and “We will fight, we will die, we will take back Iran!”
They also chanted for the release of jailed students.
In the city of Ekbatan, in western Iran, where Amini is from and where much of the resulting unrest has taken place, demonstrators chanted, “Death to Basiji!” in a cry targeting the volunteer militia full of hard-liners who frequently dispense some of the harshest treatment of demonstrators.
Details of many of the protests are piecemeal, as Iranian officials have blocked Internet and other digital connections as they frequently do in areas of intense unrest.
The head of Iran’s powerful judiciary earlier in the day pledged to act “without leniency” in the deadly crackdown on protests.
Gholamhossein Mohseni-Ejei’s comments on the judiciary’s official Mizan Online on September 25 followed a warning the previous day by hard-line President Ebrahim Raisi that the country must “deal decisively with those who oppose the country’s security and tranquility.”
Mizan Online said Mohseni-Ejei had “emphasized the need for decisive action without leniency” against the primary instigators of what he described as “riots.”
An official toll said 41 people have so far died in the unrest, but rights groups and other observers suggest the number is likely higher as protests have spread to at least 80 cities and towns.
In the French capital, protesters gathered for a second day to express outrage at Amini’s death and express solidarity with Iranians risking their freedom to speak out against the country’s hard-line religious leadership.
The French protest began at Trocadero Square in downtown Paris but was met by police in full riot gear and police vans as it approached the Iranian Embassy a short distance away.
Police fired tear gas to disperse the crowd.
Josep Borrell, the European Union’s high representative for foreign policy, hours earlier called Iran’s crackdown “unjustifiable” and “unacceptable.”
Officials in Tehran have blamed foreign governments and other outside elements for fomenting the protests.
Iran’s Foreign Ministry said on September 25 that it summoned both the British and Norwegian ambassadors over alleged actions and comments related to the unrest.
It said the British envoy was summoned over Persian-speaking media in London’s “invitation to riots” among Iranians.
Tehran summoned Oslo’s envoy over what it said were “unconstructive comments” by the Norwegian parliament’s Tehran-born speaker, Masud Gharahkhani.
The death of 22-year-old Mahsa Amini on September 16 after she fell into a coma following her detention by Iran’s morality police for an allegedly loose head covering triggered protests and rallies across Iran.
The public outrage increased after officials suggested the police did not mistreat her despite eyewitness accounts of a beating.
Interior Minister Ahmad Vahidi said that “we must wait for the final opinion of the medical examiner, which takes time.”
Defiant protesters have mostly come out at night — many of them women frustrated at decades of discrimination embodied by the harsh dress code mandating the wearing of a headscarf, or hijab, in public.
On September 23, state-organized counterdemonstrations took place in several Iranian cities, paying tribute to security forces who have moved to quell a week of protests by what media called “conspirators.”
WhatsApp, Instagram, and Skype have been blocked and Internet access restricted beyond normal levels, according to web monitor NetBlocks, following older bans on Facebook, Twitter, TikTok, and Telegram.
Amnesty International has cited “a harrowing pattern of Iranian security forces deliberately and unlawfully firing live ammunition at protesters.” It blamed Iranian security forces for shootings on one night alone, September 21, that left three children and 16 other people dead.
The group urged the international community to take “meaningful action” to force an end to the crackdown.
UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres met with President Raisi in New York on September 22 and expressed concern “about reports of peaceful protests being met with excessive use of force leading to dozens of deaths and injuries,” according to a spokesman.
He called on Iran’s security forces to avoid “unnecessary or disproportionate force” and appealed for “restraint to avoid further escalation.”
Source » rferl