Desk Report
Published: 22 Sep 2022, 03:02 pm
The crowd chanted 'Death to the dictator', meaning Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, while some women took off their headscarves || Photo: AFP
US President Joe Biden on Wednesday declared support for a
growing protest movement that has erupted across Iran in a move that experts
noted marked a shift from then-president Barack Obama's response during
demonstrations in 2009.
His comments came as violent rallies stretched into a fifth
day in cities across Iran, reportedly resulting in the deaths of at least eight
protesters, as anger over the death of a woman in morality police custody
escalates.
“Today we stand with the brave citizens and women in Iran
who right now are demonstrating to secure their basic rights,” Mr Biden said in
his address to the UN General Assembly.
The protests began after the death on Friday of Mahsa Amini,
22, whom Iran's morality police had arrested three days earlier for allegedly
breaking the country's strict hijab law. Amini, who was from Iran's Kurdistan
province, fell into a coma after her arrest.
Protesting women have publicly burnt their hijabs and cut
their hair in front of cheering crowds. Some have even chanted “death to the
dictator”.
Mr Biden's words of support mark a shift in tactics from
when he was Mr Obama's vice president. At that time, and in response to Green
Movement popular protests, Mr Biden and his boss kept quiet for more than a
week when it came to supporting the demonstrators.
The Obama administration was heavily criticised for the
delay in responding to the protests, which came as Washington pursued a fresh
start with the Iranian regime and later focused on nuclear talks that
culminated in the 2015 Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA).
This time, Mr Biden's administration is being more vocal,
even at a critically delicate moment in negotiations with Iran to resume the
JCPOA.
On Monday, for instance, Secretary of State Antony Blinken
said Amini “should be alive today”.
Ali Vaez, the director of the Iran Project at the
International Crisis Group, saw support for protesters as an indication of a
two-pronged approach by the administration.
“The US is clearly demonstrating that it can walk and chew
gum at the same time: negotiate to curb Iran’s nuclear programme while
protesting Iran’s efforts to curb its women’s rights,” Mr Vaez told The
National.
Other senior administration officials, including National
Security Adviser Jake Sullivan and US Special Envoy for Iran Robert Malley,
also condemned Iran over Amini’s death and spoke in support of women demanding
their rights.
Mr Vaez expected the administration to follow its pledges of
support with penalties directed at Iran if it unleashes a bloody crackdown
against protesters similar to what happened in 2009.
“More sanctions against human rights violators and more
sanctions relief aimed at ensuring the Iranian people’s access to the free flow
of information [will follow],” the expert said.
Authorities in Tehran have blocked access to social media
platforms such as Twitter and Instagram, digital monitor NetBlocks reported.
Holly Dagres, a senior fellow at the Atlantic Council, said
more is needed from the Biden team in showing support for the protesters.
“Condemnation from the US president on the international
stage is important, but actions speak louder than words,” Ms Dagres told The
National.
“How will the international community, particularly the
West, hold Iran accountable for the rise in repression in the country?
“From what we've already seen for the past four decades,
there are no red lines for the Islamic Republic.”
Still, she saw Mr Biden’s support as both “significant and
surprising”, noting that when protests broke out in Iran in May, “it took the
State Department over a week to react, all while [the State Department's]
Persian-language Instagram account decided to highlight popular fitness franchises
like Soul Cycle”.
In Washington, support for the current protests is
bipartisan.
The chairmen and ranking members of the Senate Foreign
Relations Committee, Democrat Bob Menendez and Republican Jim Risch, both spoke
out on Twitter about the protests. Mr Risch called Amini's death a “murder”,
while also criticising the Biden administration for continuing to try to
negotiate a new nuclear deal with Iran.
Former US ambassador to UN Nikki Haley called the protests
on Wednesday “heroic”.
“We have an obligation to tell the Iranian people’s
stories,” Ms Haley said at an event at the United Against Nuclear Iran
organisation, while urging the Biden administration to sanction human rights
abusers in Iran._Agencies