US, Israel fomenting riots: Iran
Published on: Tuesday, October 04, 2022
By: AFP
A protestor shouts slogans during a demonstration against the Iranian regime.
TEHRAN: Iran’s supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei on Monday accused arch-foes the United States and Israel of fomenting unrest in the Islamic republic following the death of Kurdish woman Mahsa Amini.“I say clearly that these riots and the insecurity were engineered by America and the occupying, false Zionist regime, as well as their paid agents, with the help of some traitorous Iranians abroad,” he said in his first public comment on the unrest sparked by Amini’s death.
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“The death of the young woman broke our hearts, but what is not normal is that some people, without proof or an investigation, have made the streets dangerous, burned the Koran, removed hijabs from veiled women and set fire to mosques and cars,” the supreme leader added.
Protests have entered their third week since Kurdish Iranian Amini, 22, was pronounced dead on September 16, days after she was detained for allegedly breaching the country’s strict dress code.
Speaking at a military graduation ceremony, Khamenei said that the “police are obliged to stand up to criminals and ensure the safety of society”.
“Weakening the police means strengthening the criminals. Those who attack the police leave people defenceless against criminals, thugs and thieves.”
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Iran has repeatedly accused outside forces of stoking the nationwide protests, especially the United States and its allies.
On Friday the intelligence ministry said nine foreign nationals—including from France, Germany, Italy, the Netherlands and Poland—had been arrested.
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Iranian students have clashed with security forces at a top Tehran university amid the wave of unrest sparked .
Concern grew over violence at Sharif University of Technology overnight where, local media reported, riot police confronted hundreds of students, using tear gas and paintball and carrying weapons that shoot non-lethal steel pellets.
“Woman, life, liberty,” students shouted, as well as “students prefer death to humiliation”, the Iranian Mehr news agency reported, adding that the country’s science minister later came to speak to the students in an effort to calm the situation.
The Oslo-based group Iran Human Rights posted video apparently showing Iranian police on motorcycles pursuing running students in an underground car park and, in a separate clip, taking away detainees whose heads were covered in black cloth bags.
In other footage, shooting and screaming can be heard as large numbers of people run down a street at night, in footage AFP has not independently verified.
“Security forces have attacked Sharif University in Tehran tonight. Shooting can be heard,” IHR said in a Twitter message Sunday.
In another video clip, a crowd of people can be heard chanting: “Don’t be afraid! Don’t be afraid! We are all together!” IHR said the footage was taken at Shariati metro station in the capital Tehran on Sunday.
The New York-based group Center for Human Rights in Iran said it was “extremely concerned by videos coming out of Sharif University and Tehran today showing violent repression of protests + detainees being hauled away with their heads completely covered in fabric”.
Mehr news agency said that “Sharif University of Technology announced that due to recent events and the need to protect students ... all classes will be held virtually from Monday”.
Since the unrest started on September 16, dozens of protesters have been killed and more than a thousand arrested. Members of the security forces have been among those killed.
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