Authorities in Iran have arrested Mahsa Amini’s father and prevented her household from holding a vigil to commemorate the first anniversary of her death, rights teams mentioned, amid reviews of sporadic protests throughout the nation regardless of a heavy safety presence.
Amjad Amini was arrested early on Saturday as he left the household house in Saqez in western Iran and launched after being warned to not maintain a memorial service at his daughter’s graveside, in keeping with the Kurdistan Human Rights Community (KHRN), the 1500tasvir monitor and the Iran Human Rights (IHR) group.
A report within the official IRNA information company, nevertheless, denied that Amjad Amini had been arrested. The company later mentioned safety forces had foiled an assassination try in opposition to him.
The demise of Mahsa Amini, a 22-year-old Kurdish lady arrested by Iranian morality police final yr for allegedly flouting obligatory costume codes, led to months of some of the biggest protests in opposition to clerical rule ever seen in Iran and drew worldwide condemnation.
Greater than 500 folks, together with 71 minors, had been killed within the protests, whereas a whole lot had been wounded and hundreds arrested, rights teams mentioned.
Iran carried out seven executions linked to the unrest.
As night time fell on Saturday, a heavy safety presence in Iran’s foremost cities and in principally Kurdish areas appeared to have deterred large-scale protest rallies however human rights teams reported sporadic confrontations in a number of areas of the nation.
Movies posted on social media confirmed folks gathered on a foremost avenue within the capital Tehran cheering a younger protesting couple as drivers honked their automotive horns in assist.
One in all Iran’s most high-profile prisoners, prize-winning rights activist Narges Mohammadi and three different girls detainees burned their headscarves within the courtyard of Tehran’s Evin jail to mark the anniversary, in keeping with a publish on Mohammadi’s Instagram.
Outdoors Tehran, on the Qarchak jail for girls, rights teams mentioned a hearth broke out when safety forces quelled a protest by inmates. The Kurdistan Human Rights Community mentioned particular forces beat up girls within the jail and fired pellet bullets. IRNA reported {that a} hearth engulfed the ladies’s ward in Qarchak after convicts awaiting execution set hearth to their garments. It mentioned the blaze was put out and there have been no casualties.
Protests had been additionally reported within the metropolis of Karaj, west of Tehran, and in Mashhad, northeast of the capital. One video posted on social media confirmed a gaggle of demonstrators within the Karaj neighbourhood of Gohardasht chanting, “We’re an awesome nation, and can take again Iran”, whereas drivers honked their horns and shouted encouragement.
Within the Kurdish metropolis of Mahabad, rights group Hengaw mentioned safety forces opened hearth, wounding at the very least one particular person. It additionally mentioned a number of folks had been wounded within the metropolis of Kermanshah however there was no official affirmation of both incident.
In Amini’s house city, the semi-official Fars information company reported that police utilizing a pellet gun had severely wounded a person who “ignored a warning”. It mentioned the person was in an intensive care ward after present process an operation, however supplied no extra element.
Hengaw recognized the person as Fardin Jafari and mentioned he had been shot within the head close to the cemetery the place Amini is buried.
Al Jazeera couldn’t confirm the report.
Hengaw additionally reported a widespread normal strike in Kurdish areas on Saturday, circulating video and images that appeared to point out streets largely empty and outlets shuttered. Human Rights Activists in Iran, one other group that intently follows occasions within the nation, additionally reported the final strike.
However state media dismissed the reviews, with IRNA saying Saqez was “utterly quiet” and that requires strikes in Kurdish areas had failed resulting from “folks’s vigilance and the presence of safety and navy forces”.
The company quoted an official within the Kurdistan province as saying: “Plenty of brokers affiliated with counter-revolutionary teams who had deliberate to create chaos and put together media fodder had been arrested within the early hours of this morning.”
Iran’s Revolutionary Guard, in the meantime, arrested a twin nationwide suspected of “attempting to organise unrest and sabotage”, in keeping with IRNA, one in every of a number of arrests of “counter revolutionaries” and “terrorists” reported.
Demonstrations and vigils had been additionally held outdoors Iran, with protesters gathering in Sydney, Paris, London, Rome, Toronto, New York and Washington, DC, to commemorate Amini’s demise.
Paris Mayor Anne Hidalgo introduced {that a} backyard within the French capital now carried Amini’s identify. The mayor referred to as Amini an Iranian resistance hero and mentioned Paris “honours her reminiscence and her battle, in addition to these of girls who struggle for his or her freedom in Iran and elsewhere”.
The Villemin Backyard that now additionally bears Amini’s identify is in Paris’s tenth district, subsequent to a canal with widespread boat excursions.
In Washington, DC, the capital of the US, a whole lot of protesters gathered in a park throughout from the White Home holding portraits of Amini. Audio system led the gang in chants of “Say her identify … Mahsa Amini”, and recited, “We’re the revolution”, in addition to, “Human rights for Iran!”
In an announcement on Friday, US President Joe Biden mentioned, “Mahsa’s story didn’t finish together with her brutal demise. She impressed a historic motion – Girl, Life, Freedom – that has impacted Iran and influenced folks throughout the globe.”
The US, in the meantime, introduced sanctions on greater than two dozen people and entities linked to Iran’s “violent suppression” of protests, whereas the UK imposed sanctions on 4 Iranian officers.
Iran has blamed final yr’s protests on the US and different international powers, with out offering proof, and has since tried to downplay the unrest even because it strikes to stop any resurgence.
In a report final month, Amnesty Worldwide mentioned Iranian authorities “have been subjecting victims’ households to arbitrary arrest and detention, imposing merciless restrictions on peaceable gatherings at grave websites, and destroying victims’ gravestones”.
Many journalists, legal professionals, activists, college students, teachers, artists, public figures and members of ethnic minorities accused of hyperlinks with the protest wave, in addition to family members of protesters killed within the unrest, have been arrested, summoned, threatened or fired from jobs previously few weeks, in keeping with Iranian and Western human rights teams.
Iran’s Etemad every day reported in August that the lawyer for Amini’s household additionally confronted prices of “propaganda in opposition to the system”.
If convicted, Saleh Nikbakht faces a jail sentence of between one and three years.
