Protests In Iran Go On As Regime Kills More People

Penny Wong, Mélanie Joly and Nanaia Mahuta said in the statement Friday that a dark chapter in Iran’s recent history unfolds and “we are responding in defense of all of its citizens.”

The Iranian regime’s brutality against its own people, in particular its women and girls, is unrelenting, and the situation is only worsening, they said.

“Iran’s security forces persist with draconian methods to ruthlessly suppress peaceful protestors, including the use of lethal force and senseless violence against women and children. Hundreds have lost their lives and thousands languish in detention, among them an unknown number of children,” reads the statement.

The ministers said we are appalled by Iran's execution of protestors since December 8.

“Nothing can justify these shameful actions. We oppose the death penalty in all circumstances for all people, everywhere.”

They called on the regime to immediately establish a moratorium to halt all executions and to end this brutal and inhumane punishment.

“The Iranian regime’s violence must end, and there must be justice and accountability for the countless, egregious human rights violations committed since the outbreak of protests,” stressed the foreign ministers.

Iran has executed two prisoners on charges of injuring and killing security forces. Mohsen Shekari and Majidreza Rahnavard both were detained during anti-government protests following the death of Mahsa Amini in mid-September.

Demonstrations and protest gatherings of Iranians abroad have increased in the past days, while the international community has intensified pressure on the Islamic Republic for to its brutal crackdown on protesters.

San Francisco, Sacramento, Rome, Hamburg, and London were among the cities where Iranian diaspora communities held gatherings on Wednesday and Thursday.

In Australia, hundreds gathered in front of the Embassy of the Islamic Republic in Canberra, in protest at the execution of two protesters and the deadly crackdown by security forces.

The demonstrators chanted slogans against the Islamic Republic and Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei demanding the cancellation of death sentences and execution of the detainees.

The Australian government also stressed its support for the Iranian protesters, and the country's Foreign Minister Penny Wong welcomed the removal of the Islamic Republic from the UN Commission on the Status of Women due to severe violations of human rights and oppression of women and girls.

On Tuesday, Berlin's Brandenburg Gate was also illuminated with the slogan “Woman, Life, Freedom” in a show of solidarity with protesters in Iran.

“It is an important sign of solidarity that we are standing here together at the Brandenburg Gate, at the landmark, the Berlin symbol of freedom, and that we are making clear: woman, life, freedom,” said Franziska Giffey, Governing Mayor of Berlin.

Hamid Farrokhnejad, in a post on his Instagram page compared Ali Khamenei with other dictators such as Francisco Franco, Mao Zedong, Joseph Stalin and Benito Mussolini, saying he is “mentally ill” just like his “colleagues”.

According to Farrokhnejad, “personable” dictators accept their fate when they get close to the end, but the “impersonable” ones, choose the costly way that leads to high casualties.

“Over time, all dictators have the illusion of assuming themselves as God, and they think they are absolutely right and eternal…but they are all mentally ill,” he added.

He also warned that the second group will die very severely, as people will take revenge from their subordinates and appointees due to the anger of the people who suffered many casualties.

Since the uprising in Iran, artists in various fields have publicly expressed solidarity with the protesters and criticized the Islamic Republic and its leaders in an unprecedented manner.

Over the past three months, the literature used to address Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei in Iran has been unprecedented, full of insults and outright rejection.

The US-based Human Rights Activists News Agency (HRANA) announced in its latest report that from September 17 until Tuesday, December 13, at least 493 protestors have been killed in Iran, of which at least 68 were minors.

The Churchill Club (Churchill-klubben in Danish) was a group of eight teenage schoolboys who under the leadership of the sixteen-year-old Knud Pedersen began targeting German occupation forces in Aalborg in 1941 and succeeded in carrying out 25 acts of sabotage before being arrested some months later.

The idea of small, independent cells to target the government and security forces with acts of sabotage across Iran was proposed by an activist on Twitter only three days ago but has already become quite popular with others on social media, who have created the “Shekari Club” hashtag and are heatedly discussing it.

Mehdi Hajati who proposed the idea in a tweet Monday, also suggested that “honorable sabotage” groups be named after Mohsen Shekari, a 23-year-old protester whose execution Thursday has enraged many Iranians.

Already, acts of sabotage directed at the government have also been reported in the past three months including firebombing buildings belonging to the Basij militia of the Revolutionary Guards (IRGC), offices of government-appointed Friday imams and lawmakers, statues of Qasem Soleimani, the Qods Force commander who was killed by the US in Baghdad in January 2020, and banners of Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei in various cities.

The voice in the video says the governor’s office in Shandiz, near the city of Mashhad in northeast Iran, was set on fire Wednesday in retaliation for the execution of Mohsen Shekari and Majidreza Rahnavard.

Pundits in Iran have warned that as the government offers no olive branch to the disgruntled population and hangs young people who have no criminal record, it pushes the protests to a revolutionary phase, and one of the characteristics of this phase would be underground activities.

Hajati explained that ‘Shekari Clubs’ can consist of two to several members who act independently and have no connection with each other. They can destroy “anything that belongs to the government or serves it”. He argued that “honorable sabotage” could help in the war against the regime now that protester turnout on the streets has dropped “for whatever reason”.

He also suggested that these groups target urban CCTV cameras as a first step in their activities as security forces use them to identify and arrest protesters.

Both Mohsen Shekari and Majidreza Rahnavard, a second protester hanged December 12 were caught with the help of footage taken by urban and private CCTV cameras. He proposed to issue a warning to citizens to remove their CCTV cameras in public places within a certain period before targeting them.

Hajati, an expatriate former reformist member of Shiraz City Council, was known for his anti-corruption campaigns during his tenure. He left the country after a year of imprisonment for defending the rights of the outlawed Baha’i religious minority.

An expatriate former police lieutenant who says he had to flee Iran after refusing to suppress protests in 2018, Fariborz Karamizand, has also been encouraging protesters to target CCTV cameras, which he calls “Satan’s eyes”.

Using his own experience, Karamizand who has become extremely popular on social media regularly posts videos to teach protesters how to fight against security forces on the streets and how to target government buildings or carry out other acts of sabotage against it.

In its last session of the year, 29 members of the 54-member UN Economic and Social Council (ECOSOC) voted in favor of a US-drafted resolution to "remove with immediate effect the Islamic Republic of Iran from the Commission on the Status of Women (CSW) for the remainder of its 2022-2026 term."

The move was the first time in United Nations history that a country was expelled from the commission, and the second blow to the Islamic Republic over its brutal crackdown on protests sparked by the death of 22-year-old Mahsa Amini in custody of hijab police. The first step to hold the Islamic Republic accountable was creating a fact-finding mission by the Human Rights Council. The Geneva-based UN Human Rights Council voted on November 24 to launch an independent investigation into the regime’s deadly repression that has killed around 500 civilians, including about 60 children.

Iran had tried its best to keep itself part of the commission through rallying its allies and a behind-the-scenes campaign to exert pressure on academic figures to send letters to numerous global bodies to urge them vote against the move. However, the result of was not unexpected as the regime’s membership in the commission was repeatedly condemned even before the current wave of protests. 

During the Wednesday session, the Islamic Republic and its friends, including China and Russia, argued that the expulsion of Iran sets a precedent that may be used against other members in the future. As usual, Tehran’s main strategy was not to address the problem directly but instead accuse other countries of human rights violations. 

Another strategy of the pro-Tehran camp was to count on countries that have grievances against the US. Iran's UN Ambassador Amir Saeid Iravani called the move illegal, describing the United States as a bully. "The US request is entirely illegal, as the Council members are fully aware that there is no precedent in the council practice of terminating an elected member's participation in a functional commission for any other reason,” Iravani said. 

The Russian envoy also tried to make the best use of UN technicalities to stop the vote, asking for a legal review of the draft, but Moscow’s motion was annulled by a quick vote before the main decision.

China's Deputy UN Ambassador Geng Shuang said, "Addressing human rights and women's issues by means of removing Iran from CSW would only set a dangerous precedent, send out the wrong message and bring about negative consequences."

The countries in favor of expelling Iran from the CSW were of the opinion that its membership would be a stain on the name of the commission as the principal global intergovernmental body exclusively dedicated to the promotion of gender equality and the empowerment of women. The text of the draft resolution denounced Iran's policies as "flagrantly contrary to the human rights of women and girls and to the mandate of the Commission on the Status of Women." 

Referring to the Iranian protesters, US Ambassador to the UN, Linda Thomas-Greenfield, told ECOSOC that "These women and activists have appealed to us, the United Nations, for support. They made their requests to us loud and clear -- remove Iran from the Commission on the Status of Women.”

She argued that it cannot do its important work “if it's being undermined from within. Iran's membership at this moment is an ugly stain on the commission's credibility.” She noted, “There are few, obviously, right and wrong answers in diplomacy. But today, today we have an opportunity to do something that is clearly the right thing to do. We can act in this moment to support women. We can act in direct response to our constituents, the global community of women.”

The move has been welcomed by many Western countries, many Iranians and activists. In a statement after the vote, US National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan described it as yet “another sign of the growing international consensus on Iran and demands for accountability.” 

“Over the last week alone, the United States has issued three separate sets of sanctions targeting Iran’s financing of terror, protest-related human rights violations, and provision of UAVs to Russia for attacks against Ukraine’s critical infrastructure. We have acted in coordination with the EU, UK, Canada, Australia, and others who have issued new sanctions under their own authorities," read the statement. 

Israeli Prime Minister Yair Lapid also praised the decision, saying, "Iran's killing of Mahsa Amini and its blatant violations of women's rights disqualify it from being a member of a committee that deals with women's rights.”

Canada-based activist Hamed Esmaeilion, whose daughter and wife were killed by the IRGC, also hailed the action, calling the regime authorities “the enemies of women, life and freedom.”

Former Donald Trump State Department spokesperson Morgan Ortagus tweeted, “Victory! The Iranian regime has been kicked off the UN Women’s Commission! At last, a small but important measure of accountability against the Islamic Republic of Iran for their gender apartheid and crimes against women."

Iranians in several cities, including the capital Tehran and in the Kurdish city of Saqqez, the hometown of Mahsa Amini, poured out onto streets celebrating the decision. Most of them see this as a victory because it may lead to more international measures, or at least make the regime retreat from its iron-fisted crackdown.