Niece of Iran’s Supreme Chief urges world to chop ties with Tehran over unrest

DUBAI (Reuters) – Iranian Supreme Chief Ayatollah Ali Khamenei’s niece, a well-known rights activist, has referred to as on international governments to chop all ties with Tehran over its violent crackdown on widespread unrest kindled by the dying in police custody of a younger girl.

A video of an announcement by Farideh Moradkhani, an engineer whose late father was a distinguished opposition determine married to Khamenei’s sister, was being extensively shared on-line after what activist information company HRANA mentioned was her arrest on Nov. 23.

“O free individuals, be with us and inform your governments to cease supporting this murderous and child-killing regime,” Moradkhani mentioned within the video. “This regime shouldn’t be loyal to any of its non secular rules and doesn’t know any guidelines besides pressure and sustaining energy.”

Khamenei’s workplace didn’t instantly reply to a Reuters request for remark.

HRANA mentioned 450 protesters had been killed in additional than two months of nationwide unrest as of Nov. 26, together with 63 minors. It mentioned 60 members of the safety forces had been killed, and 18,173 protesters detained.

The protests, sparked by the dying of younger Kurdish Iranian girl Mahsa Amini after her arrest for “inappropriate apparel”, pose one of many strongest challenges to the nation’s clerical institution because the 1979 Islamic Revolution.

Difficult the Islamic Republic’s legitimacy, protesters from all walks of life have burned photos of Khamenei and referred to as for the downfall of Iran’s Shi’ite Muslim theocracy.

The video was shared on YouTube on Friday by her brother, France-based Mahmoud Moradkhani, who presents himself as “an opponent of the Islamic Republic” on his Twitter account, after which by distinguished Iranian rights activists.

On Nov. 23, Mahmoud Moradkhani reported her sister’s arrest as she was heeding a court docket order to look on the Tehran prosecutor’s workplace. Farideh had been arrested earlier this 12 months by Iran’s Intelligence Ministry and later launched on bail.

HRANA mentioned she was in Tehran’s Evin safety jail. Moradkhani, it mentioned, had earlier confronted a 15-year jail sentence on unspecified expenses.

Her father, Ali Moradkhani Arangeh, was a Shi’ite cleric married to Khamenei’s sister and not too long ago handed away in Tehran following years of isolation on account of his stance towards the Islamic Republic, in response to his web site.

Farideh Moradkhani added in her video: “Now could be the time for all free and democratic international locations to recall their representatives from Iran as a symbolic gesture and to expel the representatives of this brutal regime from their international locations.”

On Thursday, the United Nations high human rights physique determined by a snug margin to determine a brand new investigative mission to look into Tehran’s violent safety crackdown on the anti-government protests.

Criticism of the Islamic Republic by relations of high officers shouldn’t be unprecedented. In 2012, Faezeh Hashemi Rafsanjani, the daughter of late former president Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani, was sentenced to jail for “anti-state propaganda”.