As the nationwide protests in Iran show no signs of abating, a chilling picture is emerging of the brutal treatment meted out to detainees by the security forces. According to human rights groups, protesters, including a 16-year-old child, have been subjected to sexual assault and other forms of torture while in custody.
The Kurdistan Human Rights Network (KHRN) has reported that two people, one of them a minor, who were detained in the city of Kermanshah in western Iran, have alleged that they were sexually abused by riot police during their arrests. Rebin Rahmani of the KHRN said that the detainees claimed the security forces “touched their bodies with batons” and “applied pressure to the anal area with a baton through the clothing.”
The ongoing internet blackout in Iran has made it difficult for rights groups and media outlets to obtain further details on the condition of the victims. However, the KHRN’s revelations add to the growing body of evidence of the brutal crackdown on protesters by the Iranian authorities.
During the nationwide protests in 2022, detainees had reported instances of rape, beatings, and torture by the police, with one woman telling the Guardian that she had been blindfolded and sexually assaulted by her interrogator.
The current wave of protests, which began in late December, has already claimed a heavy toll, with the US-based Human Rights Activists News Agency reporting that 3,766 people have been killed and 8,949 other deaths are under investigation. The Norway-based Kurdish human rights group Hengaw has also reported the killing of a pregnant woman, Sholeh Sotoudeh, and her unborn child, after security forces opened fire on protesters in northwest Iran on 10 January.
In the latest incident, Hengaw has reported that a 40-year-old protester, Soran Feyzizadeh, died as a result of torture while in custody. The group said that Feyzizadeh’s body was “barely recognizable due to the extent of injuries caused by repeated blows,” and that his family had to “pay a heavy sum just to retrieve his body from the authorities.”
The Abdorrahman Boroumand Center for Human Rights in Iran, a US-based organization, has documented the cases of more than 549 protesters, including 51 women, who have been transferred to Yazd central prison, and has expressed extreme concern over the lives of the detainees.
Roya Boroumand, the center’s executive director, warned that “as street protests wind down, arbitrary arrests have increased as has the risk of torture for detainees.” She added that the organization has “documented numerous cases of death in custody alongside severe physical and psychological torture, including beating, flogging and sexual assault” over the past decades.
The harrowing accounts of sexual assault and torture emerging from Iran’s protest crackdown underscore the urgent need for the international community to hold the Iranian authorities accountable for their blatant disregard for human rights. As the world watches the unfolding events in Iran, the call for justice and accountability grows ever louder.