Thursday was another action-packed day for Iran, with protesters across the country out in solidarity with Kurdish cities, and UN Human Rights Council’s rapprochement of the Islamic Republic.
Following calls for nationwide protests on Thursday in support of the residents of Kurdish-majority areas, people in many cities held protests Thursday evening to show their solidarity.
People in several neighborhoods in the capital Tehran and several other cities such as Esfahan, Karaj, Oroumiyeh, Kermanshah and Hamedan held gatherings and chanted slogans against the Islamic Republic.
Kurdish-majority cities have been scenes of the regime’s brutal crackdown since at least last week. Thursday was also the day for funeral services and mourning ceremonies for dozens of people killed in the past few days.
Videos are slow to surface on social media due to restrictions on Internet access, but social media is full of pictures of bullet casings used against the people by security forces.
Merchants and storekeepers in dozens of Iranian cities also closed their doors Thursday and workers stopped work at some factories. Reports say business owners in the cities of Mashhad, Semirom, Naqadeh, and tens of Kurdish cities joined the nationwide strikes on Thursday.
The protests came as the UN Human Rights Council adopted a resolution against the Islamic Republic while China tried but failed to stop a motion before the council. The last-minute Chinese amendment to stop Iran’s rights violations was rejected with 25 against, six in favor and 15 abstentions.
The UN Human Rights Council voted to launch an independent investigation into Iran's deadly repression of protests, that has killed around 400 civilians.
US Secretary of State Antony Blinken welcomed the resolution, and said, "The fact-finding mission established today will help ensure that those engaged in the ongoing violent suppression of Iranian people are identified and their actions documented."
Also on Thursday, Iran’s Revolutionary Guard Chief Commander Hossein Salami warned the Islamic Republic's “enemies” that his forces are very dangerous and adversaries should be careful.
The Islamic Republic's Foreign Ministry also strongly condemned the UN Human Rights Council’s "historic mistake" of establishing a fact-finding mission to probe, saying it won't recognize the mission which "violates Iran sovereignty."
While the world is becoming more vocal against the government crackdown on dissent, a lot of regime insiders have also started expressing concerns over the killing of peaceful protesters.
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The motion passed with 25 votes in favor, six opposed and 16 countries abstaining amid cheers of activists amid an intensifying crackdown in Kurdish areas of western Iran over recent days.
The mission will collect evidence into abuses during the authorities' deadly crackdown. Evidence assembled by a mission appointed by the same council was later used for the prosecution of a Syrian ex-officer in Germany who was accused of war crimes.
US Secretary of State Antony Blinken welcomed the vote.
"Today's session leaves no doubt that the HRC's membership recognizes the gravity of the situation in Iran, and the fact-finding mission established today will help ensure that those engaged in the ongoing violent suppression of Iranian people are identified and their actions documented," he said in a statement.
The United States has sanctioned three Iranian security officials over the crackdown.
During his opening remarks, UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Volker Turk provided a review of what has been happening since mid-September, when Mahsa (Jina) Amini was killed in custody of the country’s ‘morality or hijab police’, igniting a nationwide uprising against the regime.
The 35th special session of the Human Rights Council was held following an official request submitted on November 11 by Germany and Iceland, as well as the support by over 40 other states.
Turk decried the killing of protesters and lack of accountability for the perpetrators of atrocities. He also expressed concern over "unnecessary and disproportionate" use of force against protesters and the high number of arrests as well as the death sentences handed to protesters.
"The old methods and the fortress mentality of those who wield power simply don't work. In fact, they only aggravate the situation. We are now in a full-fledged human rights crisis," Turk said, adding, "The unnecessary and disproportionate use of force must come to an end. I urge the government and those in power to listen.”
He also criticized the Islamic Republic for seeking to delegitimize the protesters and label them as agents of enemies and foreign states, adding that "That's a convenient narrative. As we have seen throughout history, it's the typical narrative of tyranny."
Javaid Rehman, the Special Rapporteur on the human rights situation in Iran, was next to take the floor and speak about the grim situation. "Structural impunity has fueled widespread patterns of unlawful killings, enforced disappearance, torture and other human rights violations in Iran," he said, urging the council to "establish an independent investigative mechanism on Iran."
“Both president and head of judiciary have emphasized the need to act violently without any leniency to protesters," he emphasized.
Rehman urged Iranian authorities “to stop using the death penalty as a tool for political oppression and release peaceful protesters. We have received reports of torture including sexual abuse. Victims' families face harassment and intimidation," he said.
Tehran's representative called the debate disgraceful and appalling, before talking about the human rights situation in other countries such as women in Yemen, Palestine and even the indigenous people of Canada. She then continued with a list of statistics about the number of women in different professions in Iran such as judges and sport coaches, something that seems untrue to the Iranian people on social media.
Tehran’s allies such as Venezuela, Cuba, North Korea and China, sided with the Islamic Republic and expressed their opposition to the session or any resolution against the Islamic Republic.
China tried but failed to pass an amendment to the motion that would have stripped out the main paragraph referring to a new investigative probe into Iran's suppression of mass protests.
The last-minute amendment was rejected with 25 against, six in favor and 15 abstentions.
During the opening remarks, UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Volker Turk provided a review of what has been happening since mid-September, when Mahsa (Jina) Amini was killed in custody of the country’s ‘morality or hijab police’, igniting a nationwide uprising against the regime.
The 35th special session of the Human Rights Council was held following an official request submitted on November 11 by Germany and Iceland, as well as the support by over 40 other states.
Turk decried the killing of protesters and lack of accountability for the perpetrators of atrocities against the people as part of the crackdown on dissent. He also expressed concerns over "unnecessary and disproportionate" use of force against protesters and the high number of arrests as well as the death sentences handed to protesters. "The security forces... have used live ammunition, birdshot and other metal pellets, tear gas and batons," he said.
"The old methods and the fortress mentality of those who wield power simply don't work. In fact, they only aggravate the situation. We are now in a full-fledged human rights crisis," the High Commissioner of Human Rights said, adding, "The unnecessary and disproportionate use of force must come to an end. I urge the government and those in power to listen.”
He also criticized the Islamic Republic for seeking to delegitimize the protesters and label them as agents of enemies and foreign states, adding that "That's a convenient narrative. As we have seen throughout history, it's the typical narrative of tyranny."
Javaid Rehman, the Special Rapporteur on the human rights situation in Iran, was next to take the floor and speak about the grim situation. "Structural impunity has fueled widespread patterns of unlawful killings, enforced disappearance, torture and other human rights violations in Iran," he said, urging the council to "establish an independent investigative mechanism on Iran."
“Both president and head of judiciary have emphasized the need to act violently without any leniency to protesters," he emphasized.
Rehman urged Iranian authorities “to stop using the death penalty as a tool for political oppression and release peaceful protesters. We have received reports of torture including sexual abuse. Victims' families face harassment and intimidation," he said, adding that "The victims' families are forced to make false statements, under duress, stating that their children committed suicide. Iranian authorities spread false statements about deaths in custody and protester deaths. They fabricate false scenarios."
Tehran's representative called the debate disgraceful and appalling, before talking about the human rights situation in other countries such as women in Yemen, Palestine and even the indigenous people of Canada. She then continued with a list of statistics about the number of women in different professions in Iran such as judges and sport coaches, something that seems untrue to the Iranian people on social media.
Member states in the Council as well as observers that spoke later in the session condemned the regime for its repression and called for a moratorium on the death penalty. They decried the violence and the restrictions on Internet access for the people.
Tehran’s allies such as Venezuela, Cuba, North Korea and China, sided with the Islamic Republic and expressed their opposition to the session or any resolution against the Islamic Republic.
German Foreign Minister Annalena Baerbock said, “We are now proposing an independent and impartial UN mechanism to be established to investigate these human rights violations so that those responsible can be held accountable. Because impunity prevents justice. Justice for sisters. Justice for sons. Justice for mothers.”
She then referred to the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, to which Iran is a party, mentioning Article 19, the right to hold opinion without interference; Article 21, the right of peaceful assembly, Article 2, respect to all peoples’ rights without distinction of any kind such as gender.”
Council members are set to adopt a resolution aimed at holding the Islamic Republic accountable, which has been lobbying against the motion and sent a delegation to Geneva earlier this month to urge countries to vote against the resolution.
In another global move over Iran’s denial of women's rights and crackdown on protests, calls on the UN to expel the Islamic Republic from the UN Commission on the Status of Women are also getting stronger with Canada, New Zealand, Netherlands and the United States behind the push. UN Watch, an independent non-governmental human rights group based in Geneva, has drafted a resolution for the 54-nation UN Economic Social Council (ECOSOC) to remove Iran.
In a commentary entitled “Good But Not Enough”, the Revolutionary Guards’ Sobh-e Sadegh weekly has also adopted a surprisingly mild and somehow positive tone in discussing former reformist President Mohammad Khatami’s recent remarks about the protest movement.
The weekly is published by the political bureau of the Revolutionary Guards (IRGC) and its content is meant to set the standard for the guards and the hardliner political establishment in current affairs.
“Khatami who has a special status among reformists can prepare the grounds for dialogue [between protesters and the government] through uniting all across the reformist spectrum and reinforcing the divide with the enemies of the Iranian people,” Sobh-e Sadegh wrote.
Khatami said in a speech last week that regime change was “neither possible, nor desirable” while also warning the hardliner establishment over continuing the status quo which he said would only deepen the prospects of “societal collapse”. He proposed reforms in the system as the “least costly and most useful” way out of the current quagmire the regime has gotten itself into.
“The first step is to not only acknowledging [people’s] right to protest, but also to welcome it,” he said while criticizing the authorities’ characterization of any protest action as “rioting” to justify harsh suppression.
The weekly admitting that the former president is “still the most pre-eminent and popular figure among reformists” sounds like praise, while in recent past hardliners labeled him as “one of the leaders of the [2009] sedition” and made it clear there was no room for him, and those like him, in the country’s power structure.
Informed sources in Iran told Iran International over two weeks ago that authorities had approached some reformist and moderate figures to beseech their help in quelling the unrest that has engulfed the country, but to no avail.
Strongly worded slogans against Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei, and slogans such as, “This is not a protest, it’s a revolution!” and “This is the last message, our aim is [toppling] the system!” chanted by protesters leave no doubt that they will not be satisfied with anything other than regime change.
Accordingly, not even Khatami, whose popularity once surpassed any other Iranian official including the Supreme Leader by a mile, has significantly lost his clout among protesters who view him as ultimately a man of the system and irrelevant in the current circumstances.
The Wall Street Journal also said in an article Wednesday that the secretary of the Supreme National Security Council (SNSC) Ali Shamkhani recently approached the families of the founder of the Islamic Republic, Ruhollah Khomeini, and the former moderate president Akbar Hashemi-Rafsanjani in a bid to use their influence to calm the unrest. People close to the two families told the WSJ that both families declined to cooperate.
Shamkhani, a Khamenei loyalist, has kept a very low profile since protests began over two months ago. Ultra-hardliners of the Paydari Front blame Shamkhani for not crushing the protests in the bud and even accuse him of complicity with Khatami under whom he served as defense minister in between 1997 and 2005.
Khamenei’s hardliner devotees made sure long ago that members of both families were barred from any positions of power and even allowed vigilantes to freely attack and insult Khomeini’s grandson Hassan in public and jail two of Hashemi-Rafsanjani’s children, the outspoken daughter Faezeh and son Mehdi who is still serving a prison sentence on security-related and corruption charges.