Documents apparently stolen from an Iranian government database and released exclusively by VOA’s Persian service reveal how Iran’s Islamic rulers in recent years covered up the toll of a violent crackdown on mostly peaceful mass protests and falsely stated Label it a riot.
VOA received documents on March 6 from the hacker group Edalat-e Ali, which last month began releasing what it said were confidential Iranian government records obtained by compromising the judiciary’s computer systems.
VOA Persian reviewed the documents and believes them to be authentic but cannot independently verify their authenticity because it is banned from operating in Iran.
Iran’s mission to the United Nations in New York did not immediately respond to a request for comment emailed by VOA on Friday. Tehran has responded to past leaks of purported Iranian government documents by calling them fake.
One of the latest leaked documents from Edalat-e Ali appears to be from a November 25, 2019, meeting of Iran’s Supreme National Security Council, which is overseen by Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei.
It described largely peaceful anti-government protests across Iran in November 2019 as stemming from “destructive and turbulent behavior”. The U.S. State Department said Iranian security forces used lethal force to suppress the protests, killing about 1,500 people.
Some people involved in the November 2019 protests vandalized public buildings and businesses.
In recent years, the Iranian government has repeatedly used the term “riots” to describe peaceful protests against its authoritarian Islamic rule.
The Supreme National Security Council document instructs state media, the judiciary and other government agencies to “prohibit” the publication of “any information on the death toll” in the 2019 protest crackdown and to hold accountable those who disseminate “confidential information.”
The document also directs government agencies to take legal action against “thugs” accused of killing protesters, saying it would be “appropriate” in the circumstances to conduct an investigation, offer condolences to the victims’ families and provide media coverage.
The second document leaked by Edalat-e Ali apparently relates to a meeting of the National Internal Security Council of Iran’s Interior Ministry held on September 26, 2022. The meeting comes ten days after anti-government protests broke out across the country following the death of Mahsa Amini, a 22-year-old Iranian Kurdish woman, on September 16, 2022, while in the custody of moral police.
The document shows that the National Internal Security Council directed government agencies, including state broadcaster IRIB, to “counter” what it called the “opposition media narrative” of the protests by highlighting “rhetoric in support of the Islamic revolution.”
The National Council on Internal Security said the protesters should be classified as “thugs” and linked to groups linked to violence that resulted in death. It also urged state television to prioritize footage of incidents labeled as “mob violence” against police and civilians.
Javed Rahman, the United Nations special rapporteur on the situation of human rights in Iran, reported that Iranian authorities killed at least 520 people in their crackdown on the Amini protests.
Several men who took part in the protests have been convicted of murder by Iranian authorities in trials that rights activists say were shams based on forced confessions. Their subsequent executions sparked condemnation from Western governments and international human rights groups.
This article originated from VOA Persian Service. Click for original version of story.
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