Headscarf revolution: Barrage of arrests across Iran to quell protests

More than 1,200 people have been arrested by Iranian authorities, mostly in the north of the country, since the beginning of protests that broke out after the death of 22-year-old Mahsha Amini, who was arrested ten days ago by Iran’s morality police for not wearing properly her handkerchief.

“During the riots of these last few days, 450 rioters have been arrested in Mazandaran,” in northern Iran, provincial prosecutor general Mohammad Karimi said, according to Irna news agency.

On Saturday, Iranian authorities announced the arrest of 739 protesters, including 60 women, in Guilan, a province neighboring Mazandaran.

Citing a local official, the Fars news agency reported the arrest of 88 protesters in Hormozgan province in southern Iran.

According to the same source, the authorities also made other arrests in the cities of Zanjan, Karaz and Kerman.

The protests began on September 16, the day Mahsha Amini died, after she was arrested on September 13 in Tehran for “wearing inappropriate clothes”. The protest movement has spread to several cities, with protesters chanting anti-government slogans.

“During the past few days, rioters attacked government buildings and damaged public property in some areas of Mazandaran under the direction of foreign agents,” Karimi complained.

The head of Iran’s judiciary, Gholamhossein Mohseni Ezei, threatened yesterday, Sunday, that will show “no mercy” against protesters after 10 days of protests in the country following the death of a young woman after being arrested by the moral police, which have claimed the lives of 41 people.

The Iranian president Ibrahim Raisi he had earlier asked the security forces to react “with determination against those who harm the security and peace of the country and the people”.

Ezei insisted “on the need to act without any mercy” against the instigators of the “riots”, as reported by the website Mizan Online.

According to an official tally by Iranian authorities that includes protesters and members of the security forces, 41 people have been killed in the past ten days.

At the same time, the Iranian Foreign Ministry warned today that US attempts to violate Iran’s national sovereignty on the occasion of the protests will not go unanswered.

Tehran has accused Washington of supporting the unrest and seeking to destabilize the Islamic Republic.

“Washington has always tried to weaken Iran’s stability and security, although it has failed,” Iranian Foreign Ministry spokesman Nasser Kanaani told Nour News.

On his Instagram page, Kanaani accused the leaders of the US and some European countries of taking advantage of the tragic event to support “riots” and ignoring “the presence of millions of people in the streets and squares of the country in favor of the system.”

For its part, the Tasnim news agency published today the photos of protesters, among them women, on the streets of Qom, a holy city for Shiites located about 150 kilometers south of Tehran.

Military and security forces institutions published these images of the “instigators of the riots” and asked citizens to “identify them and inform the authorities”, the agency added.

RES-EMP

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