UN rights physique censures Iran’s ‘brutal repression’ of protests

‘That is the worst mass homicide within the modern historical past of Iran,’ says Payam Akhavan, a former UN prosecutor of Iranian-Canadian nationality

GENEVA, Switzerland – The UN rights physique condemned Iran on Friday, January 23, for rights abuses and mandated an investigation right into a latest crackdown on anti-government protests that killed 1000’s of individuals.

“I name on the Iranian authorities to rethink, to drag again, and to finish their brutal repression,” Excessive Commissioner Volker Turk informed an emergency session of the UN Human Rights Council in Geneva, voicing considerations for detainees.

The council handed a movement extending a earlier inquiry arrange in 2022 so UN investigators may additionally doc the newest unrest “for potential future authorized proceedings.”

Rights teams say bystanders had been amongst these killed through the greatest crackdown since Shi’ite Muslim clerics took energy within the 1979 revolution. Tehran has blamed “terrorists and rioters” backed by exiled opponents and international foes the US and Israel.

Iran’s mission decried the rights council’s “politicized” decision and rejected exterior interference, saying in a press release it had its personal unbiased and sturdy accountability mechanisms to analyze “the foundation causes of latest occasions.”

Twenty-five states, together with France, Mexico and South Korea, voted in favor, whereas seven, together with China and India, voted towards, and 14 abstained.

“That is the worst mass homicide within the modern historical past of Iran,” Payam Akhavan, a former UN prosecutor of Iranian-Canadian nationality, informed the assembly. He referred to as for a “Nuremberg second,” referring to the worldwide felony trials of Nazi leaders following World Warfare Two.

Iran’s ambassador to the UN in Geneva, Ali Bahreini, informed the Council its emergency session was invalid and gave Tehran’s tally of some 3,000 folks killed within the unrest.

One Iranian official, nevertheless, has informed Reuters that a minimum of 5,000 folks, together with 500 members of the safety forces, had been killed.

The US-based HRANA rights group mentioned it has to this point verified 4,519 unrest-linked deaths and had 9,049 further deaths beneath overview.

China, Pakistan, Cuba, and Ethiopia additionally questioned the utility of the rights session, with Beijing’s ambassador Jia Information calling the unrest in Iran “a matter of inside affairs.”

It was unclear who would cowl the prices of the prolonged UN inquiry amid a funding disaster that has stalled different probes. – Rappler.com