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Iran protests 2019, day 18: Over 12,000 arrested

Reporting by PMOI/MEK

Iran, December 2, 2019—Anti-regime protests that spread throughout Iran following the sudden increase in the price of gasoline continued into eighteenth consecutive day on Monday. Based on information obtained by the network affiliated to the Iranian opposition People’s Mojahedin Organization of Iran (PMOI/MEK), these protests, rallies and demonstrations have spread to at least 187 cities.

The movement continues despite a ruthless nationwide crackdown imposed by Iranian security forces on the protests and a clampdown on internet throughout the country. The MEK’s network confirms at least 600 people have been killed by regime authorities, along with over 4,000 people injured. Reports also indicate at least 12,000 protesters were arrested, adding this number is on the rise as security measures continue.

Protests continue despite heavy death tolls

The Iranian Resistance has so far obtained, confirmed and published the names of 194 protesters killed by security forces. Iranian opposition President Maryam Rajavi once again called on the international community to take urgent action to stop the killings and crackdown in Iran. “Death Toll in Iran Protests Surpasses 600; Wave of Arrests Continues- I urge the international community to take urgent action to stop the killing and repression in,” she said in a statement.

 

In an interview aired on state TV, the governor of Qods city, located west of Tehran, literally boasted in a very calm manner about how she ordered security forces to shoot and kill anyone entering the governor’s building.

Sardar Azizi, head of the police in eastern sector of Tehran Province, shed more light into the regime’s concerns over the organized nature of the recent protests. “Those who were organized in these protests had established teams ready to set ablaze and destroy their targets… Despite the fact that police units were on full alert, and Revolutionary Guards (IRGC) and Basij units were ready, the scope of the [protests] went far beyond our expectations,” he said.

International condemnation of the regime’s crimes

In a strong condemnation of the ongoing crackdown in Iran, 62 Members of the European Parliament issued an urgent statement supporting the call made by Madam Rajavi emphasizing on the fact that Iranian regime officials should face justice for crimes against humanity.

The MEPs called on the European Union and its Member States to stand alongside the Iranian people in their reach for freedom and democracy, and to end the vicious crackdown targeting protesters in Iran. The signatories of this important statement also called on EU governments to strongly condemn the crackdown of demonstrators in Tehran, called for the release of those arrested and voiced their support for the Iranian people’s uprising for a free and democratic Iran.

Harrowing account of the “worst” crackdown in 40 years

The New York Times published a report referring to the fact that at least 180 protesters by the Iranian regime’s security forces during the November 2019 uprising as the worst unrest in Iran during the past four decades.

“Iran is experiencing its deadliest political unrest since the Islamic Revolution 40 years ago, with at least 180 people killed — and possibly hundreds more — as angry protests have been smothered in a government crackdown of unbridled force,” the report reads.

In a rare acknowledgement, the Times confirmed that protesters in Iran called for “an end to the Islamic Republic’s government and the downfall of its leaders.”

The Times also reported that Iranian security forces had opened fire on unarmed protesters, who were mostly “unemployed or low-income young men between the ages of 19 and 26.”

“In the southwest city of Mahshahr alone, witnesses and medical personnel said, Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps members surrounded, shot and killed 40 to 100 demonstrators — mostly unarmed young men — in a sugar cane field where they had sought refuge,” the Times writes.

Eyewitnesses who spoke to the Times recounted how the Revolutionary Guards deployed a large force to Mahshahr on Monday, Nov. 18, to crush the protests.

According to the Times: “For three days, according to these residents, protesters had successfully gained control of most of Mahshahr and its suburbs, blocking the main road to the city and the adjacent industrial petrochemical complex. Iran’s interior minister confirmed that the protesters had gotten control over Mahshahr and its roads in a televised interview last week, but the Iranian government did not respond to specific questions in recent days about the mass killings in the city.

“Local security forces and riot police officers had attempted to disperse the crowd and open the roads, but failed, residents said. Several clashes between protesters and security forces erupted between Saturday evening and Monday morning before the Guards were dispatched there.

“When the Guards arrived near the entrance to a suburb, Shahrak Chamran, populated by low-income ethnic Arabs, they immediately shot without warning at dozens of men blocking the intersection, killing several on the spot, according to the residents interviewed by phone.

“The residents said the other protesters scrambled to a nearby sugar cane field, and that one of them, apparently armed with an AK-47, fired back. The Guards immediately encircled the men and responded with machine gun fire, killing as many as 100 people, the residents said.”

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