Far from accusing the social setback generated by the arrest and murder of Masha Amin around the world, the Iranian government that presides over Ebrahim Raisi insists on adjusting pegs: The Iranian judiciary announced that it will bring to trial the more than two thousand people arrested during the recent protests in Tehran and the interior of the country.
And while the world echoes the violence against women in the Arab nation (the German chancellor, Olaf Scholzannounced that he will ask the European Union to sanction the Corps of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard as a terrorist organization), Iran is only concerned that its soccer team will be excluded from the World Cup in Qatar: Raisi contacted the hosts of the tournament so as not to be banned from Group B, which includes England and the United States.
The latest signs of outside support for the Iranian women- and student-led protests included sit-ins at European universities, and more than 500 female journalists signed a petition which demands that the journalists who helped publish Amini’s story be released. But the Iranian government is not willing to give in. And he accuses those journalists of espionage: two women who were instrumental in reporting on Amini’s death have been labeled by the regime as CIA agents. Niloofar Hamedi and Elahe Mohammadiwere arrested shortly after the news of Amini’s death broke and are today being held in Iran’s Evin prison.
The Iranian statement on the matter, which refers to the two women as NH and EM, describes the street protests as a pre-planned operation by the CIA, Mossad and other agencies Western intelligence. And he accuses both women of being “main sources of news for foreign media.” It marks that Hamedi “impersonated a journalist to force Mahsa Amini’s family” to release the photo of her daughter hospitalized (after being tortured and beaten by the Islamic Revolutionary Guard).
Hamedi was the first journalist to report from the hospital where Amini was being treated after the beating. of the Revolutionary Guard, who arrested her for wearing the hijab incorrectly. And Mohammadi has been accused by the Iranian intelligence ministry of receiving foreign agent training: she is actually in jail for her reporting on Amini’s funeral in her hometown of Saqqez. And she was arrested on September 22 when security forces broke down her door and seized her phone and computer.
The Iranian government statement, which was sent to local news agencies last Friday night, was received with astonishment. The crime of espionage carries the death penalty in Iran, and more than 40 journalists have been arrested since protests broke out in the streets across the country.
The Iranian Human Rights Activists News Agency (HRANA) estimates that more than 220 people have already died at the hands of government repression since the demonstrations began more than six weeks ago. “We are being closely monitored and I have been advised to cut all ties with foreign correspondents. If they check my phone records and find out that someone from the west called me, even if he is a friend, it will be a great risk to my life, ”an Iranian journalist, whose identity was naturally kept secret, told the Washington Post.
The moves for label journalists as spies they are part of a concerted attack on the media in Iran, to impose silence. “They will use this statement and conclusion to make more arrests or, worse yet, execute citizens for espionage,” the same journalist advanced.
And the raid is already a fact: Mohammad Ghobadloa protester who was arrested on charges of “corruption” after participating in an anti-government demonstration, was sentenced to death after only one hearing. “My son is only 22 years old and he is sick. They deprived him of having a lawyer and do not allow him to defend himself in court, ”said Ghobadlo’s mother in a video that went viral.
Some 1,000 protesters are to be tried for “subversive actions”, which include assaulting security guards, setting fire to public property and other charges, for which they could spend years in prison, which increases the tense social climate.
Iran’s ruling elite, however, remains divided between those who want to treat the protests as the product of a foreign conspiracy, and a minority who understand that the unrest, now in its sixth week, reveals deep social problems. The head of the Iranian judiciary, Gholam-Hossein Mohseni Ejei, decreed that there will be no understanding: “Those who intend to confront and subvert the regime, depend on foreigners and will be punished.” “They wanted to bring down the Islamic Republic,” he concluded.
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