Two years after Mahsa Amini’s death, US issues fresh sanctions on Iran over human rights violations

The United States along with its allies — Canada and Australia — imposed new sanctions on Iran Wednesday, targeting 12 individuals linked to the country’s “ongoing violent repression of its people,” specifically focusing on the regime’s “brutal crackdown on peaceful protests.”

The measures come two years after the death of Kurdish-Iranian woman Mahsa Amini while in police custody. The sanctions focus on members of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC), Iranian prison officials, and those involved in lethal operations abroad, according to a statement from the US Treasury Department as quoted by Reuters.

Amini, a 22-year-old woman, died on September 16, 2022, after being arrested by Iran’s morality police for allegedly not wearing the mandatory headscarf, or hijab, according to the authorities. Her death ignited widespread protests against Iran’s hijab laws and its ruling theocracy.

The sanctions target officials accused of killing and detaining protesters, as well as suppressing protests in 2019 and 2022 and arresting journalists. Despite the campaign promises of Iran’s new reformist President Masoud Pezeshkian to end harassment of women by the morality police, reports have continued to surface of women and girls being mistreated by officers.

In 2023, a teenage girl was injured on Tehran’s Metro for not wearing a headscarf and later died in hospital. In July, activists reported that police shot at a woman trying to avoid a checkpoint set up to enforce hijab laws.

US Treasury official Bradley T Smith commented, “Despite the Iranian people’s peaceful calls for reform, Iran’s leaders have doubled down on the regime’s well-worn tactics of violence and coercion.” He added that the US and its allies “will continue to take action to expose and hold accountable those responsible for carrying out the Iranian regime’s cruel agenda.”

The sanctions, which block access to US properties and bank accounts and prevent the sanctioned individuals and entities from conducting business with the US, are largely symbolic as many of those targeted do not engage with the United States.

In March, a United Nations fact-finding mission concluded that Iran was responsible for the “physical violence” leading to Amini’s death. The mission also found that the Islamic Republic used “unnecessary and disproportionate force” to suppress the demonstrations that followed her death and that Iranian security forces committed sexual assault against detainees.

– With Inputs from Associated Press and Reuters

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