Mass executions, impunity for the perpetrators, persecution of bereaved relatives: the toll is grim in Iran, two years after a popular revolt that many hoped would mark a turning point in the history of the Islamic Republic.
Whether they are in exile or behind bars, anti-regime activists want to believe that the protest movement born after the death in detention of Mahsa Amini – a 22-year-old Iranian woman arrested in September 2022 for not respecting the strict Islamic dress code – will not have been in vain.
Denouncing the compulsory wearing of the veil and religious conservatism, the demonstrators, led by women, defied the Iranian authorities for months, at the cost of heavy repression: at least 551 people were killed, and thousands of others arrested, according to human rights NGOs.
While the protests are now limited and sporadic, the government continues to crush them methodically: Iran has executed ten men sentenced to death in cases linked to the movement, the last of whom, Gholamreza Rasaei, 34, was hanged in August, a few days after the new president, Massoud Pezeshkian, took office.
Human rights groups also denounce the increase in executions for all types of offences, intended to create fear and dissuade opponents from any desire to protest.
It was from Evien prison, near Tehran, that the 2023 Nobel Peace Prize winner Narges Mohammedi, detained since November 2021, announced on Sunday the start of a hunger strike by 34 prisoners to “defeat theocratic despotism” and “the oppressive policies of the government”.
– “Blows”, “slaps” –
According to the Norway-based Iran Human Rights (IHR) organization, at least 402 people were executed in the first eight months of the year.
“Countless people in Iran continue to suffer the consequences of the authorities’ brutal repression,” said Diana Eltahawy of Amnesty International.
According to Human Rights Watch (HRW), relatives of dozens of people killed, executed or imprisoned during the protests have been threatened, harassed and even arrested themselves on false charges.
“Iranian authorities are brutalizing people twice: they execute or kill a family member, then arrest their relatives for demanding accountability,” said Nahid Naghshbandi, Iran researcher at HRW.
Among those imprisoned is Mashallah Karami, the father of Mohammad Mehdi Karami, who was executed in January 2023 at the age of 22 in a case linked to the protests. Mr Karami, who had campaigned to save his son’s life, was sentenced to six years in prison in May and then to nine years in August.
Meanwhile, authorities are working hard to enforce regulations on the compulsory wearing of the hijab, the abolition of which was a key demand of the protesters. Amnesty notes a “visible increase in patrols on foot, on motorbikes, in cars and in police vans in public spaces”.
To strengthen this system, Parliament is expected to shortly adopt a bill aimed at “supporting the culture of chastity and the hijab.”
While personal vehicles have long provided a safe space for Iranian women, they are now being targeted in their cars, often using recognition technology.
UN experts accuse Iran of “intensifying” its repression of women, notably through the recurrent use of violence, “beatings” or “slaps” as sanctions.
– “Lost legitimacy” –
Amnesty has denounced the fate of Arezou Badri, a 31-year-old woman left paralysed after she was shot by police in July while she was driving in northern Iran during a check related to dress regulations.
A UN fact-finding mission concluded in March that the authorities’ repression of protests amounted to “crimes against humanity”, but no officials have ever been held to account.
“Two years after the protests, the leaders of the Islamic Republic have neither restored the status quo ante nor regained their lost legitimacy,” says Roya Boroumand, co-founder of the US-based Abdorrahman Boroumand Center.
And “many young women remain protestors,” she continues.
While the protest movement has shaken the regime, it has also highlighted divisions within a motley opposition that is unable to reach an agreement, both in Iran and abroad.
The protest movement “has shown the absolute failure of alternatives to oppose the regime,” observes researcher Arash Azizi, author of the book “What Iranians Want.”
But he added: “I continue to believe that Iran will not return to the situation it was in before 2022. In the coming years, the Islamic Republic will probably experience fundamental upheavals.”
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