By Iran Probe staff
“The cruelty of the Iranian authorities knows no bounds, in their sinister attempt to cover up their crimes”, says Diana Eltahawy, Amnesty International’s Deputy Regional Director for the Middle East and North Africa.
This statement makes it clear that the rulers of Iran recognize no rights whatsoever for their people. Eltahawy continues, “The authorities are compounding the anguish and suffering of victims’ families by preventing them from demanding justice, truth and reparation or even planting flowers at their loved ones’ graves. As the anniversary of the uprising nears, victims’ families fear that the authorities will deploy their usual repressive tactics to bar them from holding commemorations”.
Amnesty International has attributed a whole report to the Iranian regime’s cruelties towards the families of the victims: This report explains how Iranian authorities arbitrarily arrest and detain the families of the victims, destroy the gravestones of the victims and impose cruel restrictions on the families of the dead to prevent any protest gatherings
Some examples provided in the report include:
• Milad Saeedianjoo, shot and murdered by security forces in Khuzestan city of Izeh, on 15 November 2022. Her sister was beaten up by a government agent who was trying to break her brother’s gravestone.
• The authorities have raided the parental home of Houman Abdollahi, while they were gathering to commemorate his death, beating and arresting all those present, and subjected all the family members to beatings and/or arrest. Houman Abdollahi, was shot and unlawfully killed by security forces on 7 December 2022 in Sanandaj, Kurdistan.
• In an anti-government protest in Piranshahr, West Azerbijan, on 29 October 2022, security guards shot and killed 16-year-old Kourmar Daroftadeh. Later on 16 August 2023, government forces arbitrarily arrested six members of Kourmar’s family, including his parents, detained them for several hours, and released them after a few offensive interrogations.
• The father of a 15-year-old girl, who was beaten and murdered by the security forces, was arrested and sentenced to six and a half months in prison. He was charged with “disturbing public order” when he, and others, gathered at the cemetery and mourned those killed.
• The whole family of a 19-year-old girl killed by security agents were arrested and jailed, when they gathered at her grave at her “29th birthday”.
• . On 21 January 2023, Kian Pirfalak’s mother, Zeynab (Mah Monir) Molayirad, was summoned by the authorities and verbally told that she was suspended from her teaching job. Five days later, on 26 January 2023, Kian Pirfalak’s paternal uncle, Mehrdad Pirfalak, posted a text in an Instagram story along with a photo of his brother, Meysam Pirfalak, Kian Pirfalak’s father, lying in a hospital bed with severe injuries sustained during the same incident that killed Kian Pirfalak:
• Homes of some of the victims’ families have been raided, such as the house of brother of Ghader Golvan in Kurdistan. Ghader was
Unlawfully killed by security forces during a violent crackdown on Protests in Oshnavieh, West Azerbaijan province, in September 2022.
Many families have been warned not to hold memorial ceremonies
Diana Eltahawy, Amnesty International’s Deputy Regional Director for the Middle East and North Africa says, “In view of the systematic impunity in Iran, Amnesty International calls on all states to exercise universal jurisdiction and issue arrest warrants for Iranian officials, including those with command responsibility, who are reasonably suspected of criminal responsibility for crimes under international law committed during and in the aftermath of the uprising,”
