Atrocities Tribunal Says Top Iran Diplomat Demanded UK Stop Its Work

Two human rights experts who have followed the aftermath of the protests and have documented atrocities, as well as a doctor who was on duty during the protests testified.

Bahar Saba, a researcher from Amnesty International told the Tribunal that weapons used by security forces in the protests show that they intended to kill unarmed demonstrators.

The tribunal, organized by several human rights groups convened in London Wednesday to examine the atrocities and violence against protesters in Iran in November 2019. Iran declined an invitation from the organizers to take part.

Saba also told the panel of judges that security forces had fired tear gas into homes where children were present and fired pellet guns at underage people in the streets. A 16-year-old lost his eye as a result.

Shadi Sadr, a human rights expert and activist representing Justice for Iran, said that her organization had collected 2,298 videos of the protests showing violence and killing of demonstrators and onlookers in 86 cities and 29 provinces. After verifying the images, in 310 videos shooting was audible or dead bodies could be seen.

In the morning session, witness number 31, whose bother was shot dead by security forces, testified. He said that the military prosecutor at the time refused to name the officer responsible for his brother’s death but told him “We will deal with him.” Later, the family received information from the military court that security forces had fired 700 bullets at protesters, despite initial denials.

The witness, whose identity was disguised to protect his security in Iran, said that on the day of his brother’s burial, the police closed schools around the cemetery and took up position on the roofs, ready to open fire in case of any spontaneous protests.

A doctor, who testified from Iran and was tagged as witness 109, said that security agents were canvassing patients to identify any wounded protesters and were not allowing the hospital to admit any casualties from the protests.

The four-day Tribunal heard numerous testimonies or recorded videos from Iran. The organizers say that Iranian officials who ordered security forces to kill protesters should remain unpunished. They demand the United Nations forms an investigative committee to look into the violence that killed hundreds of unarmed protesters. Reuters reported in December 2019 that Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei had ordered to suppress the protests and up to 1,500 people were killed.

Several residents in villages around the town of Saqez were rounded up by security forces and taken to an unknown location, Hengaw, a Kurdish rights group said. Abdollah Mahjuz, a former political prisoner and his cousin Mohammad Mahjuz were among those detained.

The reason for the arrests is not clear, but security forces regularly detain Kurdish citizens on suspicions of political activities or membership in underground groups.

Hengaw also reported that 20 people were arrested around the town of Baneh in Kurdistan. The Kurdistan Human Rights Network, another monitoring group, also reported that dozens of agents in civilian clothes stormed several other villages near Baneh and arrested ten people. Local sources told the rights group that agents entered home and after confiscating personal items, detained citizens with verbal and physical violence. In some cases, agents beat up family members who prevented their illegal entry into their homes.

These reports also said that security personnel are present in Baneh’s streets and nearby villages.

The tribunal, which styles itself a “Russell tribunal” after the late British philosopher Bertrand Russell, convened in London Wednesday to examine the atrocities of violence against protesters in Iran in November 2019. Iran declined an invitation from the organizers to take part.

Social media traffic showed great interest among Iranians in following the proceedings and posting comments.

‘Witness 195,’ who said he was a former major in the Iranian police, testified via video-link disguising his voice to protect his identity, that he had refused a command from an officer in the Revolutionary Guards (IRGC) to deploy his 60 officers to suppress the protests in a city in the west of Iran. He said he had told the police under his command they had “no right to use firearms against unarmed protesters.”

Witness 195 claimed he had seen "plainclothes agents of the IRGC and intelligence ministry spraying the protesters with bullets,” killing 15 on November 19. "Armed [agents] shot at protesters with no purpose other than intimidating them," he said. The witness said that the security forces had destroyed public property and blamed protestors.

Witness 195 said he was arrested a few months later for disobeying an order to shoot at the protesters, held in solitary confinement and subjected to psychological torture. He said he had been sentenced to nearly six years in prison but that the sentence had not been enforced.

‘Witness 128’ testified in person that he had witnessed the killing of two protesters in the southeastern province of Sistan-Baluchestan.

After the tribunal was shown video footage of protests on a road leading to Rask, a city of Sistan-Baluchestan, witness 128 said he had seen IRGC forces 200 meters from where the film was taken, and claimed they had shot at protesters from nearby villages trying to reach Rask by the road.

‘Witness 366,’ testifying via videoconference, displayed an x-ray, which he said was of his chest and showed a bullet, lodged in his spine on November 16, 2019, that had put him in a wheelchair. Witness 366 told the tribunal he was certain he had been shot by security forces and not by armed protestors.

The tribunal on Thursday also heard Raha Bahraini, a researcher at Amnesty International, report that many arrested protesters, including children, had been sexually assaulted, raped, or tortured by hanging and staged executions.

"This people's tribunal is very important," Bahraini told Iran International. "It's a strong initiative against the continued impunity for crimes in Iran," she said. Bahraini said there was no chance of justice through the Iranian judicial system so responsibility fell on the United Nation's Human Rights Council and the United Nations Security Council to bring those responsible for the “atrocities” to justice.

The Iran Atrocities Tribunal convened in London Wednesday with testimonies from family members who sent recorded messages or testified via video on the alleged killing of their relative in protests in November 2019.

Regina Paulose, a member of the tribunal's counsel and an attorney who focuses on genocide and crimes against humanity, told Iran International that there was no “question of impunity” for Iran’s leaders. "The people's tribunal makes it known that… the leaders have to be accountable," she said.

While ‘atrocity’ is not a legal term, the tribunal follows the model of the Russell Tribunal on Palestine, which was held 2009 to 2014 to review alleged Israeli war crimes against Palestinians following the notion of ‘people’s tribunals’ advocated by British philosopher Bertrand Russell.

"When a similar tribunal was held for Palestine, [Iran's] Press TV was probably the only media outlet in the world that broadcast it live," journalist Mehdi Mahdavi-Azad said. "When such tribunals are concerning itself, they boycott them and make no mention at all.”

Mahboubeh Ramezanifard, mother of Pejman Gholipour, told the tribunal in a recorded message that she had kept her son’s “bloody clothes to show the world as evidence that my child was murdered.” Ramezanifard said her son’s jacket had “holes on both sides because he was shot with a live bullet."

In the afternoon session, United States-based opposition activist Masih Alinejad testified from her “own findings” that the Iranian authorities had made the families of those killed in the protests bury the corpses in remote places. Alinejad said this was “psychological torture.”

Alinejad also said “authorities” had threatened families not to talk to foreign media and has asked two for the cost of the bullet used to kill them. "The families believe there is no justice in Iran,” she said. “You can take your complaint against murderers to the murderers themselves.”

"We want this tribunal to hear the truth from witnesses," Shadi Sadr, a director of Justice for Iran, one of the tribunal organizers, told Iran International Wednesday.

Speaking via video to the tribunal, Nahid Shirbisheh said her son Pouya had been shot in the head while protesting peacefully alongside his mother in Karaj. She said hers was the first family to openly tell the world about “the atrocities of the Islamic Republic.”

"We didn't fear the consequences,” she said. “As a result, we have constantly been threatened and detained. Pouya's father is still in prison, in solitary confinement for seeking justice.”

The tribunal will in the next few days also hear the testimony of three Iranian police officers, a judicial official, and two doctors who tended to the wounded at their offices or homes to avoid arrest. These witnesses have travelled to London secretly.

On October 24, Richard Ratcliffe began a hunger strike outside the UK Foreign Office. The aim of the protest is to draw attention to the fact that his wife Nazanin Zaghari-Ratcliffe is still detained in Iran and unable to return to her family after five and a half years of separation.

Zaghari-Ratcliffe was convicted in an Iranian court of plotting against the Iranian regime, which she has always denied. She has been held in Iran since 2016 and is under house arrest following a second sentence and failed appeal.

As a psychologist with an interest in the effect of fasting on brain function, I have followed Ratcliffe’s hunger strike closely. Two UCL colleagues and I visited him on day 12 and made a short film (below) of our conversation. I spoke with him about the effect of his hunger strike on his mental state.

He described feeling somewhat slower in his thinking and perhaps less able to switch from one topic to another. But he still struck me as an impressive character, greeting all sorts of visitors – from an MP who dropped by to chat, to an Iranian woman who had been detained in the notorious prison where Zaghari-Ratcliffe spent four years. Although still calm, determined and dignified, it was clear that the lack of food was starting to affect his thinking. For example, his speech was noticeably slower than in previous media interviews.

Four days after our conversation, Ratcliffe was interviewed on Radio 4’s PM program. While still clearly passionate about his wife’s plight, he sounded increasingly fatigued and, at times, his speech was a little slurred.

Alongside the well-documented physical effects of going without food for this length of time, psychologists and neuroscientists have increasingly taken an interest in the psychological effect of such experiences.

Some aspects of thinking are surprisingly well preserved when people are in a state of starvation. An international review of short-term fasting studies did not find evidence that memory or reaction times were seriously affected.

But executive function, which includes planning, inhibition (holding back a response when it is inappropriate) and flexibility of thinking, seems to worsen when people are starved, although the effects depend on how few calories a person is consuming and for how long this restriction has lasted. Of course, the risk of increased rigidity in a hunger strike is that it becomes more difficult for the person to have the flexibility to decide when it is the right time to end their protest.

Studies of attention also suggest that this is also negatively affected by even short periods of fasting. However, a few studies have even suggested that repeated brief fasts may improve some aspects of concentration and memory and even reduce depressive symptoms. But, of course, this is quite different from the extended hunger strike that Ratcliffe has been undergoing.

Part of the difficulty in understanding the effect on Ratcliffe is that research studies have not asked people to starve for longer than about four days, because it would be unethical. The studies we reviewed in our recent paper looked at periods of fasting of between four hours and four days, so Ratcliffe is now in uncharted territory.

Those who fast for spiritual reasons commonly report altered states and feelings of being purified and recharged. A study by our group showed that both positive and negative emotions can increase following a period of fasting. While negative emotional states can include increased irritation, some people also reported an increased sense of achievement, reward, pride and control.

Of course, people’s emotional reactions are likely to depend on the reason they are not eating, whether this is for religious reasons, health reasons, for research or – as in Ratcliffe’s case – for ideological reasons. Ratcliffe’s frustration at his wife’s continuing detention may be enhanced by the hunger strike, but any sense of achievement and pride he may feel at doing something so difficult may be dampened by his discussions with the UK’s foreign secretary, Liz Truss, in which he reports that there was no change in the government’s approach to breaking the deadlock with Iran.

The-Conversation is provided by Reuters