By Pishtaz | 2023-09-07

Human rights groups have accused Iranian regime officials of further intensifying an already intense crackdown on the public in fear of new protests ahead of the upcoming anniversary of the September 16, 2022, death of Mahsa Amini.

The death of 22-year-old Amini in the custody of the regime's "morality police" sparked the protests, which morphed into an anti-establishment movement mostly focused on Iranian women's rights and freedoms.

A new report, jointly published by the US-based Center for Human Rights in Iran (CHRI) and France-based Kurdistan Human Rights Network (KHRN), has detailed what it referred to as a "massacre in Javanrud".

The report exposes the ways in which the Iranian regime's security forces and members of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) purposely killed or injured peaceful protestors in the primarily Kurdish city of Javanrud in late 2022.

Several reports previously have accused security forces of conducting an indiscriminately severe crackdown in cities where the majority of the population is Kurdish or Baluch -- Sunni ethnic minorities in majority Shia Iran.

According to the new CHRI-KHRN report, the regime's security forces "committed atrocities against the people of Javanrud" in northwestern Iran as "the state moved to crush public protests" from October to December of 2022.

Violence against civilians

The report says Iran's security forces used military-grade machine guns to target, shoot and corner unarmed civilians. The wounded were beaten in the streets, and those who tried to help them were shot by security forces, it added.

"The wounded could not seek help safely at the city's hospitals as security forces were stationed at the medical centers to identify and arrest protesters," it said.

"Ambulances that tried to reach the city from surrounding towns were often prevented from entering the city by IRGC forces that took control of the city."

During the protests in Javanrud, eight people -- including a 16-year-old -- were killed with machine guns, and 80 people were injured, some severely, it added.

A further 89 people, including 26 children, were arbitrarily detained while protesting in Javanrud, the report said, adding that many of the demonstrators, including children, were beaten and tortured while in state custody.

Families of the injured, killed, detained and abused were pressured by the state to remain silent, according to the report.

"The atrocities committed by Islamic Republic forces and agents, which were carried out with the full knowledge and direction of state officials... amount to crimes against humanity," it said.

The regime has summoned family members of those killed by security forces while protesting peacefully.

According the report, state agents have warned the families of those killed, injured or detained to remain silent about their loved ones' fates.

The report called on the international community to "directly address the massacre and state crimes that took place in Javanrud through every diplomatic, political, economic and legal means available."

Sexual assault in prison

The regime has been detaining journalists who have covered Amini's death and the ensuing protests, some of whom have defied the state's dress code.

Among them is Iranian journalist Nazila Maroufian, 23, who interviewed Mahsa Amini's father, Amjad Amini, after his daughter's death. In the interview, he accused officials of lying about the circumstances of his daughter's death.

Maroufian has been repeatedly detained by regime forces and released on bail.

She was most recently detained in Tehran on August 30 after she removed her state-mandated hair coverage and is currently in Tehran's notorious Evin prison.

In an audio message from Evin that was aired September 6 by several expatriate Persian-language media outlets and rights groups, Maroufian said she had been sexually assaulted during her most recent arrest.

"I was sexually assaulted in a situation where I was in the worst possible state," she said in the message, which appeared to have been recorded during a phone call to her family, adding that she was now on hunger strike in prison.

Her family also shared pictures of bruises she allegedly sustained in the assault.

"This strike is for me, but it is also for all the women in dire conditions in Iran," she said.

"Nazila Maroufian has been arrested for wearing inappropriate clothing in public places, and for publishing photographs of the way she was dressed on social media," the hardline Tasnim news agency reported.

Before her latest arrest, Maroufian was released on bail on August 13 from Evin prison after spending more than a month behind bars, and immediately posted a picture of herself without a headscarf.

Answering a question in court about posting the picture upon release and whether she regrets it, she said, "No, I haven't made any mistake."

Over the past year, an increasing number of women have been appearing bareheaded across Iran, especially in major cities.