PARIS: Iranian security forces have killed at least 326 people in a crackdown on nationwide protests since Mahsa Amini’s death in custody, Iran Human Rights said in an updated toll Saturday.
The Islamic republic has been gripped by protests that erupted over the death of Amini on September 16, three days after her arrest for an alleged breach of the country’s strict dress code for women.
The protests were fanned by fury over the dress rules for women, but have grown into a broad movement against the theocracy that has ruled Iran since the 1979 revolution.
“At least 326 people, including 43 children and 25 women, have been killed by security forces in the ongoing nationwide protests,” Oslo-based IHR said in a statement posted on its website.
The latest toll represents an increase of 22 since the rights group issued its previous figures on November 5.
It includes at least 123 people killed in the province of Sistan-Baluchistan, on Iran’s southeastern border with Pakistan, a figure which is also up, from 118 in IHR’s last toll.
Most of those were killed on September 30 when security forces opened fire on protesters after Friday prayers in Zahedan, the capital of Sistan-Baluchistan — a massacre activists have dubbed “Bloody Friday.”
Those protests were triggered by the alleged rape in custody of a 15-year-old girl by a police commander in the province’s port city of Chabahar.
Analysts say the Baluchi were inspired by the protests that flared over Amini’s death, which were initially driven by women’s rights but expanded over time to include other grievances.
IHR director Mahmood Amiry-Moghaddam called on the international community to act as soon as possible to halt the crackdown.
“Establishing an international investigation and accountability mechanism by the UN will both facilitate the process of holding the perpetrators accountable in the future and increase the cost of the continuous repression by the Islamic republic,” he said in the statement.
Another rights group, Amnesty International, has also called for such a mechanism, which it said was supported by a petition signed by more than one million people.
IHR said it was still investigating reports of other deaths, meaning the actual number killed “is certainly higher.”
At least 326 killed in Iran protest crackdown: New toll
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At least 326 killed in Iran protest crackdown: New toll
- The Islamic republic has been gripped by protests that erupted over the death of Mahsa Amini
- "At least 326 people, including 43 children and 25 women, have been killed by security forces in the ongoing nationwide protests," Oslo-based IHR said
Israel confirms ban on 37 NGOs in Gaza
JERUSALEM: Israel on Thursday said 37 humanitarian agencies supplying aid in Gaza had not met a deadline to meet “security and transparency standards,” and would be banned from the territory, despite an international outcry.
The international NGOs, which had been ordered to disclose detailed information on their Palestinian staff, will now be required to cease operations by March 1.
The United Nations has warned that this will exacerbate the humanitarian crisis in the war-ravaged Palestinian territory.
“Organizations that have failed to meet required security and transparency standards will have their licenses suspended,” Israel’s Ministry of Diaspora Affairs and Combating Antisemitism said in a statement.
Several NGOS have said the requirements contravene international humanitarian law or endanger their independence.
Israel says the new regulation aims to prevent bodies it accuses of supporting terrorism from operating in the Palestinian territories.
Prominent humanitarian organizations hit by the ban include Doctors Without Borders (MSF), the Norwegian Refugee Council (NRC), World Vision International and Oxfam, according to a ministry list.
In MSF’s case, Israel accused it of having two employees who were members of Palestinian militant groups Islamic Jihad and Hamas.
MSF said this week the request to share a list of its staff “may be in violation of Israel’s obligations under international humanitarian law” and said it “would never knowingly employ people engaging in military activity.”
‘Critical requirement’
NRC spokesperson Shaina Low told AFP its local staff are “exhausted” and international staff “bring them an extra layer of help and security. Their presence is a protection.”
Submitting the names of local staff is “not negotiable,” she said. “We offered alternatives, they refused,” hse said, of the Israeli regulators.
The ministry said Thursday: “The primary failure identified was the refusal to provide complete and verifiable information regarding their employees, a critical requirement designed to prevent the infiltration of terrorist operatives into humanitarian structures.”
In March, Israel gave NGOs 10 months to comply with the new rules, which demand the “full disclosure of personnel, funding sources, and operational structures.”
The deadline expired on Wednesday.
The 37 NGOs “were formally notified that their licenses would be revoked as of January 1, 2026, and that they must complete the cessation of their activities by March 1, 2026,” the ministry said Thursday.
A ministry spokesperson told AFP that following the revocation of their licenses, aid groups could no longer bring assistance into Gaza from Thursday.
However, they could have their licenses reinstated if they submitted the required documents before March 1.
Minister of Diaspora Affairs and Combating Antisemitism Amichai Chikli said “the message is clear: humanitarian assistance is welcome — the exploitation of humanitarian frameworks for terrorism is not.”
‘Weaponization of bureaucracy’
On Thursday, 18 Israel-based left-wing NGOs denounced the decision to ban their international peers, saying “the new registration framework violates core humanitarian principles of independence and neutrality.”
“This weaponization of bureaucracy institutionalizes barriers to aid and forces vital organizations to suspend operations,” they said.
UN Palestinian refugee agency chief Philippe Lazzarini had said the move sets a “dangerous precedent.”
“Failing to push back against attempts to control the work of aid organizations will further undermine the basic humanitarian principles of neutrality, independence, impartiality and humanity underpinning aid work across the world,” he said on X.
On Tuesday, the foreign ministers of 10 countries, including France and Britain, urged Israel to “guarantee access” to aid in the Gaza Strip, where they said the humanitarian situation remains “catastrophic.”
A fragile ceasefire has been in place since October, following a deadly war waged by Israel in response to Hamas’s unprecedented October 7, 2023 attack on Israel.
Nearly 80 percent of buildings in Gaza have been destroyed or damaged by the war, according to UN data.
About 1.5 million of Gaza’s more than two million residents have lost their homes, said Amjad Al-Shawa, director of the Palestinian NGO Network in Gaza.
