The UN fact-finding mission report says Iran's brutal crackdown on the 2022 protests amounted to crimes against humanity.
Iran has condemned a report by United Nations experts that concluded that the Islamic republic's violent crackdown in 2022 on peaceful protests and targeted attacks on women and girls were serious rights violations, many of which amount to crimes against humanity. humanity.
The report was based on “baseless claims” and “false and biased information, with no legal basis,” Iranian Foreign Ministry spokesman Nasser Kanaani said on Saturday.
Demonstrations spread across Iran following the September 2022 death in custody of Mahsa Amini, a 22-year-old Iranian Kurdish woman who was arrested for allegedly violating the strict Islamic dress code for women.
Iranian authorities refused to participate in the expert investigation commissioned by the UN Human Rights Council in November 2022.
“The expert committee not only failed to establish the truth, but also deliberately distorted the facts,” Kanaani said.
In its first report, the independent international fact-finding mission said Friday that many of the violations discovered “amount to crimes against humanity, specifically murder, imprisonment, torture, rape and other forms of sexual violence, persecution, enforced disappearances and other acts.” inhuman.”
This was part of “a widespread and systematic attack directed against the civilian population in Iran, specifically against women, girls, boys and men who have demanded freedom, equality, dignity and accountability,” said Sara Hossain, who chairs the mission of three members. .
The report urged authorities to “provide justice, truth and reparation to victims of human rights violations in relation to the protests.”
Kanaani claimed that the report “was prepared by the Zionist regime [Israel]United States and some Western countries,” which “continued a project of Iranophobia and defamation of Iran.”
These countries were “angry at the failure of their interventions during the unrest,” Kanaani said, referring to the protests.
A special committee tasked by Iranian President Ebrahim Raisi with investigating the protests “recently sent its final report to the president,” he added, but did not provide details about its findings.
The UN experts said “no [fewer] More than 551” protesters were killed by security forces, who “used unnecessary and disproportionate force.” They said dozens of people were blinded, adding that they also found evidence of extrajudicial executions.
Instead of carrying out a proper investigation into Amini's death, Tehran “actively hid the truth,” they said.
During the crackdown, people who were “simply dancing” or honking car horns were arrested, while hundreds of children, some as young as 10, were also detained.
The report will be presented to council on March 15.
This week, Amnesty International reported that Iranian authorities have launched a massive campaign to enforce mandatory hijab laws “through widespread surveillance of women and girls in public spaces and massive police checks targeting female drivers.”
