Joe Biden promises more Iran sanctions amid crackdown
Washington has decided to impose new sanctions against Tehran after the violent crackdown on protests in Iran.
Mahsa Amini was arrested on September 13 in Tehran for “wearing inappropriate clothes” by the morality police, before dying on September 16 in hospital. (illustrative image)
AFP
Joe Biden said in a statement on Monday that “this week the United States will impose new sanctions on perpetrators of violence against peaceful protesters” in Iran.
The US president says he is “gravely concerned by reports of the increasingly violent crackdown on protesters in Iran, including students and women” and promises: “The United States stands with Iranian women and all citizens Iranians whose courage is an inspiration to the world.”
The United States is “alarmed and outraged” by Iranian authorities’ crackdown on student protests, White House spokeswoman Karine Jean-Pierre previously said.
Accusations of Ayatollah Khamenei
Violent clashes erupted between students and security forces at a major university in Tehran, more than two weeks after protests sparked by the death of Mahsa Amini began, state media and NGOs said on Monday. Iranian Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei on Monday accused sworn enemies the United States and Israel of fomenting the anti-government protest movement.
“The way the Iranian government treats women and this violent crackdown on peaceful protests…is exactly the kind of behavior that drives talented young Iranians to leave their country by the thousands in search of dignity and opportunities,” he said. Joe Biden’s spokeswoman.
Karine Jean-Pierre, however, felt that the United States could on the one hand condemn this repression, and on the other continue negotiations to try to resurrect the 2015 international agreement on Iranian nuclear.
“The best way”
This agreement is “the best way in our opinion to approach the nuclear problem”, she assured. “As long as we believe that continuing (these) discussions is in the national security interest of the United States, we will.”
“At the height of the Cold War, when President Reagan called the Soviet Union ‘the evil empire’, he was also conducting arms control negotiations” with the Russians, she justified. Washington had already announced on September 22 a salvo of sanctions targeting the Iranian morality police and several security officials.
Mahsa Amini, 22, was arrested on September 13 in Tehran for “wearing inappropriate clothes” by the morality police responsible for enforcing the strict dress code in the Islamic Republic. Women must cover their hair and are not allowed to wear short or tight coats or jeans with holes. She died on September 16 in hospital.
AFP
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