IRAN JUDICIARY CHIEF ORDERS HARSH SENTENCES FOR ‘MAIN RIOT ELEMENTS’

Thu 13 October 2022:

As protests over the death of Mahsa Amini, a young woman who passed away in custody nearly a month ago, continue, Iran’s judiciary chief has instructed judges to impose harsh sentences for the “main elements of riots.”

“I have instructed our judges to avoid showing unnecessary sympathy to main elements of these riots and issue tough sentences for them while separating the less guilty people,” the Iranian semi-official Students News Agency quoted Gholam-Hossein Mohseni-Ejei as saying on Thursday.

Mohseni-Ejei had previously ordered courts across the country to fast-track the cases of those arrested.

The officials said the indicted individuals, about whom no information was disclosed, were responsible for “creating illegal gatherings, arson, and violation of a number of government and private places”.

The indictments come after Iran’s judiciary chief, Gholam-Hossein Mohseni-Ejei, had earlier ordered courts across the country to fast-track the cases of those arrested in connection with “riots” while last week, a top security official had issued a stern warning to participants.

“Anyone who is arrested at the scene of the riots will not be freed under any circumstances until the time of their trial, which will be held quickly and will issue assertive and deterring sentences,” Majid Mirahmadi, deputy for security and police affairs at the interior ministry, told local media.

Ali Salehi, prosecutor general in Tehran, said on Wednesday that 60 indictments have been issued for “rioters” in the capital, according to the state-run IRNA news agency. Another 65 indictments have been issued in the southern province of Hormozgan and arrest orders were in effect for 13 more individuals, said local judiciary chief Mojtaba Ghahremani.

Protests amid restricted internet access

Officials have said stringent internet curbs, which restrict access at certain times to messaging service WhatsApp and photo-sharing app Instagram, will remain in effect due to “security considerations” as long as the unrest continues.

Netblocks, an internet censorship observatory, reported a “major disruption” to internet traffic on Wednesday that it said would likely “further limit the free flow of information”.

But even with a delay, videos of the protests continue to circulate on social media, and people inside and outside the country use the online platforms to share calls for demonstrations.

Videos online and accounts by rights groups this week have shown intensified protests in Sanandaj, the capital of the Kurdistan province where Amini was from.

Amnesty International said it was “alarmed” by what it said were reports of “security forces using firearms and firing teargas indiscriminately, including into people’s homes”.

In his only remarks about the protests, Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei said earlier this month that the United States and Israel were behind the “riots and insecurity” across the country.

The protests started in mid-September after Amini, 22, died while in the custody of Iran’s so-called “morality police” for an alleged breach of the country’s strict dress code for women.

A report last week by the medical examiner’s office did not specifically mention the cause of Amini’s death but said she had a brain tumour operated on when she was eight, and no blows were dealt to her head or other organs.

Amini’s family have refuted the authorities’ account that she was not beaten, and has also questioned the validity of the coroner’s report.

Her death triggered the biggest protests in Iran since 2019 when a surprise move to ration fuel and raise prices sparked unrest.

Last week, Majid Mirahmadi, deputy for security and police affairs at the interior ministry, had warned that “anyone who is arrested at the scene of the riots will not be freed under any circumstances until the time of their trial, which will be held quickly and will issue assertive and deterring sentences”.

SOURCE: INDEPENDENT PRESS AND NEWS AGENCIES

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