Unrest continues in Iran’s Kurdish region

Iran Focus: Tehran, Iran, Aug. 10 – Sixty Iranian women activists made a public appeal on Thursday for the release of a Kurdish feminist campaigner who has been held incommunicado for more than a week after she protested against the Islamic government’s repressive measures in Kurdish areas of Iran. Iran Focus

Tehran, Iran, Aug. 10 – Sixty Iranian women activists made a public appeal on Thursday for the release of a Kurdish feminist campaigner who has been held incommunicado for more than a week after she protested against the Islamic government’s repressive measures in Kurdish areas of Iran.

“More than a week after the arrest of Dr. Roya Toloui, who is a founding member of Kurdish Women for Human Rights group, she has not been allowed to receive any visits from her two children and her lawyer”, the women wrote in an open letter to Judiciary Chief Ayatollah Mahmoud Shahroudi.

The letter comes in the wake of continuing unrest and clashes in Iran’s Kurdish region between the restive Kurds and government forces. The names of 17 Iranian Kurds shot dead by the security forces since late July have been released. They included three anti-government protesters shot dead in Oshnavieh on July 26, two killed in Baneh on July 30, one shot dead in Sardasht on August 2, and 11 killed in Saqqez on August 3.

Hundreds of residents of the town of Javanroud clashed with security forces on Saturday. Young people chanted anti-government slogans and condemned the brutal crackdown on protesters in the town of Saqqez. Several government buildings were attacked during the protests.

Fresh demonstrations broke out on Monday in the town of Kamyaran, where hundreds of residents chanted anti-government slogans and clashed with the security forces. Clashes continued well past midnight and young protesters attacked government buildings, including state-owned banks. Dozens of protesters were arrested.

On the same day, protesters and government forces fought hit-and-run battles in the districts of Ghafour and 25 Shahrivar in the city of Sanandaj. A 13-year-old demonstrator was shot and wounded during the clashes.

The death under torture of a young man, Shahou Amjadi, who had been detained in a previous demonstration, inflamed the already tense situation in the city. On Saturday, another Sanandaj resident, Zanyar Ashyan, was shot dead at point blank by the paramilitary police. On the same day, plainclothes intelligence agents arrested another activist, Jalal Bahmani, in his office in Sanandaj.

The government’s response to the ongoing unrest in Kurdistan has been to step up the repression and make more arrests. In the early hours of Tuesday, two Kurdish human rights activists, Saman Rasoulpour and Zeynab Bayazidi, were arrested by the security forces in the town of Mahabad. More arrests were reported in Saqqez, Bukan, Dehgolan and Ghorveh.