Iran jails 400 people for up to 10 years over anti-regime protests

A woman shows a placard with a photo of of Iranian Mahsa Amini as she attends a protest against her death. AP.

Tehran: As agitations escalate in Iran, courts in and around capital Tehran have annouced jail terms for up to 10 years to 400 people on charges of recent protests.

Iran has now been officially using the term “rioters” for all the demonstrators who deft the Islamic country’s hardline theocratic rule.

The judiciary’s Mizan Online website quoted judiciary chief for Tehran province, Ali Alghasi-Mehr saying, “One hundred and sixty people were sentenced to between five and 10 years in prison, 80 people to two to five years and 160 people to up to two years.”

The number of jail sentences is expected to be several times higher in the country as Iran has 31 provinces and Tehran is just one of them.

UN human rights experts estimate that over 14,000 people have been arrested across Iran since mid-September when the protests began following the death of 22-year-old Kurdish-Iranian woman Mahsa Amini who was allegedly beaten into a coma by morality police for wearing her hijab the wrong way.

The agitations continued unabated with Iranians expressing their rage over decades of oppression, misogyny in the name of religion, and international isolation.

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Unmoved by the protests and plight of the people, authorities responded with force and even fired and beat protesters. The UN office of the high commissioner for human rights has said more than 300 people, including at least 40 children, have been killed in the crackdown.

To prevent further protests and restrict the rallies from spreading, Iran has now imposed internet blackouts.

Harsh sentences are being pronounced by the courts in Iran for protesters going against the regime. Recently, 11 death sentences have been announced, two of which have been carried out.

The recent executions have drawn criticism for Iran from not just locals but by several other nations across the world.

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