(Beirut) – Iran’s security forces repressing widespread protests have unlawfully killed, tortured, sexually assaulted, and disappeared children as part of a pattern of serious violations, Human Rights Watch said today.
Iranian authorities have also arrested, interrogated, and prosecuted children in violation of legal safeguards, and judges have barred children’s families from hiring lawyers of their choice to defend them, convicted children on vague charges, and tried them outside of the youth courts that have sole jurisdiction over children’s cases. Security forces have arrested and detained children without notifying their families, sometimes for weeks. Students released from detention have been barred from returning to school, or authorities have cut off their families’ social welfare, resulting in the children having to go to work.
“Iranian leaders have unleashed their brutal security forces to sexually assault and torture children, and have not spared children from ludicrously unfair trials,” said Tara Sepehri Far, senior Iran researcher at Human Rights Watch. “Over the past seven months, the authorities have not hesitated to extend the coercive power of the state to silence even children.”
Read the report here
