The United States has imposed sanctions on Iran’s morality police and leaders of presidency companies after the demise of a lady in police custody sparked protests and worldwide condemnation.
At least 9 protesters and two safety pressure officers have been killed in violent demonstrations for the reason that weekend following 22-year-old Mahsa Amini’s demise.
The morality police detained Miss Amini final week, saying she did not correctly cowl her hair with the Islamic scarf – often called the hijab – which is obligatory for Iranian girls. Miss Amini collapsed at a police station and died three days later.
The US Treasury designated the leaders of the Iranian Ministry of Intelligence and Security, the Army’s Ground Forces, the Basij Resistance Forces, and different regulation enforcement companies for the sanctions – which deny them entry of their properties and financial institution accounts held within the US.
“These officials oversee organisations that routinely employ violence to suppress peaceful protesters and members of Iranian civil society, political dissidents, women’s rights activists, and members of the Iranian Baha’i community,” the Treasury stated in a information launch.
Police say Miss Amini died of a coronary heart assault and deny she was mistreated, and the federal government launched video footage purporting to indicate the second she collapsed.
But her household says she had no historical past of coronary heart hassle, and her demise in police custody has triggered daring shows of defiance from protesters, within the face of beatings and attainable arrest.
Independent specialists affiliated with the UN stated on Thursday that reviews advised she was severely crushed by the morality police, with out providing proof.
Niloufar Hamedi, a journalist who took images on the hospital after Ms Amini’s demise, was arrested on Thursday, in keeping with the reporter’s lawyer, Mohammadali Kamfirouzi.
He stated her home was raided.
Women lower their hair in solidarity
Women have taken to the streets of Tehran and across the nation and lots of Iranians, notably the younger, have come to see her demise as a part of the Islamic Republic’s heavy-handed policing of dissent and the morality police’s more and more violent therapy of younger girls.
The protests have grown within the final 5 days into an open problem to the federal government, with girls eradicating and burning their state-mandated headscarves within the streets and Iranians calling for the downfall of the Islamic Republic itself.
“Death to the dictator,” has been a typical cry within the protests.
They are probably the most severe demonstrations since 2019, when protests erupted over a authorities hike within the worth of petrol.
One state TV anchor advised the demise toll from the mass protests might be as excessive as 17 – however didn’t make clear how he had reached that determine.
Miss Amini’s demise additionally sparked condemnation from the United States, the European Union and the United Nations.
A wave of girls worldwide have uploaded movies to social media platforms, slicing off their hair in solidarity with Iranian girls.
Germany’s overseas minister Annalena Baerbock, who was in New York on Thursday for the UN General Assembly, condemned the crackdown and stated Germany would increase the violation of girls’s rights on the UN Human Rights Council.
“The brutal attack on the brave women in Iran is also an attack on humanity,” she stated.
Iranian president calls for US journalist put on scarf
In New York, Iranian President Ebrahim Raisi took to the stage on Wednesday on the UN General Assembly.
CNN’s chief worldwide anchor Christiane Amanpour stated she had deliberate to confront Mr Raisi concerning the protests in what can be his first US-based interview, however the president pulled out when she refused to put on a headband.
“We are in New York, where there is no law or tradition regarding headscarves. I pointed out that no previous Iranian president has required this when I have interviewed them outside Iran, ” the British-Iranian anchor wrote beside a photograph of Mr Raisi’s empty chair.
“I couldn’t agree to this unprecedented and unexpected condition,”
“As protests continue in Iran and people are being killed, it would have been an important moment to speak with President Raisi.”
Source: information.sky.com”