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Abuse, spanking, electric shock, mock executions, water torture, and sexual abuse. These are just a few examples highlighted in a new report on the treatment of detainees, detainees and convicts in Iran in connection with the wave of protests in November last year.
Demolition following protests in Shahriar, about 40 kilometers southwest of Iran’s capital Tehran, in November last year. Stock Photography.
The regime hit hard against the great wave of protests against rising fuel prices for Iranians who were already in financial distress. Amnesty International has collected data from witnesses, family members and many of the thousands detained by police and security forces in just a few days.
According to Amnesty, the report is a “catalog of appalling human rights violations” carried out by state police, military, militias, security services and prison officials with the knowledge of prosecutors and judges.
These include assault, spanking, electric shock, mock executions, water torture, sexual abuse, forced ingestion of various chemicals, or deliberate refusal to provide necessary care and medications. Amnesty also lists arbitrary arrests, disappearances, fabricated criminal charges, forced confessions, and unfair trials.
Among the victims are children up to the age of ten, as well as bystanders and protesters who have been picked up from hospitals where they sought care for gunshot wounds. Human rights activists, journalists and participants in memorial ceremonies for the dead also suffered.
“In the days after the mass protests, video footage of Iranian security forces deliberately killing and injuring unarmed protesters and bystanders sent shockwaves across the world.” Much less visible has been the catalog of atrocities to which the Iranian authorities have subjected prisoners and their families, “Diana Eltahawy, deputy director of Amnesty’s Middle East and North Africa Department, said in a statement.
Hundreds of people have been sentenced to prison, flogging and at least three to death in summary trials, according to the report. Prison sentences range from one month to ten years, often issued with vague justifications for violating security laws, spreading anti-state propaganda, vandalism and insults to the country’s top leaders.
“Instead of investigating allegations of enforced disappearances, torture, abuse and other crimes against prisoners, Iranian prosecutors became involved in the crackdown,” the report continues.
Iranian judges are also considered to have flagrantly betrayed their duty of justice.
Amnesty claims to have the names of more than 500 prisoners: journalists, human rights activists and others who have been victims of injustices in the judicial system in connection with the protests.
The organization calls on various UN agencies to take steps to address the impunity enjoyed by Iranian government officials despite documented widespread human rights abuses.
The power of the clergy
Iran is a theocracy, where Islamic laws form the basis of legislation and the courts. The power emanates from the supreme spiritual leader, since 1989 Ayatollah Ali Khamenei. Presidents and parliaments are elected by the people, but the clergy have supreme power.
Civil rights are severely restricted and human rights violations are widespread. The opposition is brutally silenced with imprisonment, torture, whipping or execution.
The woman is considered subordinate to the man and does not have the same legal rights.
Source: Landguiden / UI
