Region

GENEVA — The bloody repression of peaceful demonstrators in Iran must end, the UN rights chief insisted on Thursday, as countries discussed launching an investigation into Tehran's deadly crackdown.

Volker Turk opened an emergency session of the UN Human Rights Council, where countries were called to discuss Iran's "deteriorating human rights situation" and determine if a high-level international investigation is warranted.

The meeting, requested by Germany and Iceland with the backing of more than 50 countries, follows two months of protests in Iran sparked by the death in custody of 22-year-old Mahsa Amini, after she was arrested for an alleged breach of the country's strict dress rules for women based on Islamic sharia law.

"I call on the authorities immediately to stop using violence and harassment against peaceful protesters," Turk said, in his first address to the council since becoming the United Nations' high commissioner for human rights last month.

"The unnecessary and disproportionate use of force must come to an end," he said, warning that Iran was in "a full-fledged human rights crisis".

He urged the 47-member council to vote in favour of an investigation.

Turk said he had offered to visit Iran since taking up his post last month but so far had received no reply.

'Staggering number' 

Iranian authorities have grown increasingly heavy-handed in their response to the demonstrations as they have spread across the country and swelled into a broad movement against the theocracy that has ruled Iran since 1979.

Turk said more than 300 people had been killed since Amini's death. Norway-based group Iran Human Rights has put the toll above 400, including more than 50 children.

"The security forces... have used live ammunition, birdshot and other metal pellets, tear gas and batons," Turk said.

He also said around 14,000 people, including children, had been arrested over the protests, describing this as "a staggering number", and decried that at last six death sentences had been handed down to demonstrators.

Others who took the floor on Thursday put the number of arrests even higher, with German Foreign Minister Annalena Baerbock saying more than 18,000 had been arrested.

She urged the council to vote for a so-called independent international fact-finding mission to probe all abuses connected with the ongoing protests, to ensure “those responsible can be held to account”.

“Impunity prevents justice. Justice for sisters, sons, mothers. They have names. Jina, Abolfazl, Minoo,” she said, listing some of the many killed.

She told reporters that the requested investigation would collect evidence towards holding perpetrators to account — although it remained unclear what jurisdiction would try them.

“If we don’t collect the evidence today, if we don’t support this resolution, justice will never come to the victims,” Baerbock said.

US ambassador Michele Taylor agreed.

“We are all watching with horror as events unfold in Iran,” she told the council, as members of her staff held up pictures and lists of names of those killed in the crackdown.

“The people of Iran are demanding something so simple, something that most of use here take for granted: The opportunity to speak and to be heard.” 

Iran meanwhile slammed the Western countries behind Thursday’s meeting.

Wearing a black chador, Khadijeh Karimi, Iran’s deputy of the vice president for women and family affairs, insisted before the council that Europe and the United States “lack the moral credibility to preach... on human rights and to request a special session on Iran”.

“Reducing the common cause of human rights to a tool for political purposes of specific groups of Western countries is appalling and disgraceful,” she said.

Iran received backing from some countries, with China’s ambassador Chen Xu warning against “turning human rights into a tool to intervene into other countries internal affairs”, while Russian Ambassador Gennady Gatilov slammed the call for an investigation as “fundamentally illegitimate”.

Icelandic Foreign Minister Thordis Kolbrun Reykfjord Gylfadottir disputed that Thursday’s meeting was “politically motivated”.

“Nor is it about the so-called West imposing their values on the people of Iran,” she told reporters.

“This is about respecting, protecting and fulfilling human rights and fundamental freedoms.”

“It is the right thing to do.”

QAMISHLI — Turkish strikes Wednesday targeted Kurdish forces controlling northern Syria's Al Hol detention camp, home to over 50,000 people including relatives of suspected extremists, Kurdish forces and a war monitor said.

"Turkish planes targeted the [Kurdish] Asayesh security forces with five strikes inside the camp," said Farhad Shami, a spokesman for the Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF).

The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, a Britain-based war monitor, instead claimed the strikes targeted forces guarding the camp's exterior, "sparking chaos among [camp] residents".

Neither source immediately reported casualties.

Among Al Hol's detainees are more than 10,000 foreigners from dozens of countries.

The overcrowded camp is also home to displaced Syrians, and Iraqi refugees.

It is the largest camp for displaced people who fled after Kurdish forces, backed by a US-led coalition, dislodged Daesh terror group fighters from the last scraps of their Syrian territory in 2019.

The SDF warned relatives of fighters might try to flee the camp.

Ankara launched a campaign of air strikes across parts of Iraq and Syria on Sunday as part of Operation Claw-Sword, following a bombing in Istanbul on November 13 that killed six people.

Earlier on Wednesday Turkey said it was more determined than ever to secure its Syrian border from attacks by Kurdish forces, threatening a ground operation "at the most convenient time".

Ankara says it is targeting rear bases of the Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK) -- which is blacklisted as a terror group by the European Union and the United States — and the Syrian Kurdish People's Protection Units (YPG), which dominate the SDF.

The United States urged "an immediate de-escalation in northern Syria" in a statement issued on Wednesday.

"We are deeply concerned by recent military action that destabilises the region, threatens our shared goal to fight Daesh, and endangers civilians and U.S. personnel," said Ned Price, spokesman for the US State Department.

Both Kurdish groups denied responsibility for the Istanbul attack. 

TEHRAN — An improvised bomb has killed an Iranian colonel from the aerospace division of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps near Syria's capital Damascus, Iranian media reported on Wednesday, blaming arch foe Israel.

The Islamic republic regularly calls for the destruction of Israel, which in turn sees Iran, with its nuclear and ballistic missile programmes and its regional proxies, as its biggest security threat.

"Colonel Davoud Jafari, one of Iran's military advisers in Syria and a member of the Guards' aerospace arm, was killed with a makeshift bomb planted by the roadside," the Tasnim news agency reported citing a Guards statement.

The IRGC's aerospace department manufactures drones, missiles and satellites.

Tasnim said Jafari was killed on Monday "by associates of the Zionist regime" — its term for Israel, a country with which Iran has waged a shadow war of attacks, assassinations and acts of sabotage for years.

It vowed that "undoubtedly, the criminal Zionist regime will receive the adequate response for this crime".

Tehran accuses Israel of a campaign of assassinations, including of scientists involved in what Iran insists is a peaceful nuclear programme.

The Israeli air force destroyed what it said was an Iranian drone manufacturing plant located on Syrian territory on October 24.

Syrian authorities had not yet confirmed the killing of Jafari. 

Britain-based war monitoring group the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, which relies on sources in the county, reported Jafari was killed with his Syrian bodyguard when the bomb blast hit their vehicle. 

The attack took place near Sayyida Zeinab, a south Damascus district that hosts a shrine revered by Shiite Muslims and is home to many Iranians.

Series of attacks 

Jafari was the highest-ranking Guards officer killed in Syria since August 23, when Tehran announced the "martyrdom death" of General Abolfazl Alijani, a Guards ground forces commander who was on a mission in Syria.

Alijani was hailed as a “defender of the sanctuary”, a term used for those who work on behalf of Iran in Syria or Iraq.

Iran says it has no troops in Syria but IRGC military “advisers”.

Israel has reportedly carried out multiple strikes in Syria in recent months. 

They include one that killed five government troops in Damascus, and two that caused significant damage to the airport in the second city of Aleppo.

In March, the Guard announced the deaths of two high-ranking officers killed in an Israeli attack in Syria, threatening to retaliate to avenge them.

On November 9, an unclaimed raid targeted a pro-Iranian militia convoy carrying weapons and fuel from Iraq into Syria, killing at least 14 people according to the Observatory.

Israel rarely comments on its military operations in Syria.

But it has acknowledged carrying out hundreds of air and missile strikes in Syria since the civil war broke out in 2011, targeting both government positions and Iran-backed forces.

ISTANBUL — President Recep Tayyip Erdogan said Tuesday that Turkey would "soon" launch a ground operation in Syria against Kurdish militants following air raids.

"We have been on top of terrorists for a few days with our planes, cannons and drones," Erdogan said in a televised address. "God willing, we will root out all of them soon with our tanks, artillery and soldiers."

Turkey on Sunday launched Operation Claw-Sword, hitting Kurdish militant targets in northern Iraq and Syria after a deadly attack in Istanbul.

The government has blamed the November 13 bombing on the outlawed Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK), listed as a terror group by Turkey and its Western allies.

The United States late Monday urged de-escalation and Russia said Tuesday it hoped Turkey would exercise "restraint" and refrain from "excessive use of force" in Syria.

Erdogan said his government knew "who protects, arms and encourages those terrorists", in a veiled reference to Washington, which relied heavily on Syrian Kurdish forces in the fight against the Islamic State group.

He said Turkey was patient enough, "not because it was desperate", but because it was loyal to diplomacy.

"The road has come to an end for those who think they can keep Turkey waiting by playing with letters and changing the name of the terrorist organisation," said Erdogan.

Turkey considers Syrian Kurdish militants as a terror group linked to the PKK.

"After this moment, there is only one measure for us, there is only one limit: It is the security of our own country, our own citizens," Erdogan said.

Russia on Tuesday called for Turkey to exercise "restraint" and warned against "destabilising" Syria, where Ankara has carried out air strikes and is threatening to launch a ground offensive against Kurdish fighters.

"We understand and respect Turkey's concerns regarding its own security. We believe this is the legal right of Turkey," Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov told reporters.

"We still call on all parties to refrain from steps that could lead to seriously destabilising the situation," he said.

He added that it could “boomerang back and further complicate the security situation”.

The Kremlin’s comments came as representatives from Russia, Turkey and Iran, major players in the war in Syria, meet in the Kazakh capital Astana for trilateral talks on Syria.

Russia’s special envoy on Syria, Alexander Lavrentyev, told reporters earlier in Astana that “We hope to convince our Turkish colleagues to refrain from resorting to excessive use of force on Syrian territory” to “avoid the escalation of tensions”.

“Russia has for months... done everything possible to prevent any large-scale ground operation,” Lavrentyev said in the Kazakh capital.

DOHA —Iran's players did not sing their national anthem before their first game of the World Cup against England on Monday in apparent support for anti-government protesters in their homeland.

Ahead of the game in Qatar which Iran lost 6-2, captain Alireza Jahanbakhsh said the team would decide together whether to refuse to sing the anthem in a show of solidarity for demonstrations that have rocked the regime in the Islamic republic.

The Iranian players stood stony-faced as their anthem rang out around the Khalifa International Stadium in Doha.

Iran has been shaken by two months of nationwide protests since the death of 22-year-old Mahsa Amini in morality police custody on September 16.

Amini, a 22-year-old Iranian of Kurdish origin, died three days after her arrest in Tehran over an alleged breach of the dress code for women, which includes the mandatory hijab headscarf.

The players' behaviour in Doha is being closely scrutinised because many of the opponents of the Iranian regime have expressed anger at what they view as the lack of support from the team known as Team Melli.

That image was reinforced for many when the players had an audience with Iran's ultra-conservative President Ebrahim Raisi before they left for the World Cup.

'Freedom, freedom' 

It made for a charged atmosphere before the match. 

After the players had stood impassively for the anthem, TV cameras briefly picked out a woman in the crowd, a headscarf on her head and tears in her eyes. 

Sardar Azmoun, the team's star who had expressed support for the protests on social media earlier this year, was brought on in the second half. He appeared a shadow of the player he has been for his German club Bayer Leverkusen in recent months.

A banner with the slogan of the protest movement, "Women Life Freedom", was briefly hoisted among the Iranian supporters and now and again shouts of "Azadi, Azadi", meaning "freedom, freedom", rang out.

In the Iranian capital Tehran, about 200 people gathered to watch the match on a giant screen near the national library.

Farzad, a 21-year-old student who did not want to give his full name, said: "I have always supported the national team, but not this time because the players have not supported the people.

"On this occasion, I was not upset by the team's defeat."

In Qatar, the team's Portuguese coach Carlos Queiroz said the political unrest at home had taken a toll on the squad.

"It is not right to come to this World Cup and ask them to do things that are not their responsibility. They want to bring pride and joy for the people," Queiroz told reporters. 

"You don't even imagine behind the scenes what these kids have been living in the last few days, just because they want to express themselves as footballers."

The crackdown since Amini's death has left nearly 400 people dead, according to Oslo-based group Iran Human Rights.

The state's response has led to questions over whether the team represents Iran or the regime that has ruled with an iron fist since the Islamic Revolution of 1979.