Amnesty documents sexual violence in more than half of all provinces
The extent of sexual violence related to the “Woman, Life, Freedom” movement is difficult to assess because stigma and fear of reprisal often prevent those affected from reporting such cases. However, the fact that Amnesty was able to extensively document 45 cases in more than half of Iran’s governorates, and that survivors and other former detainees reported additional cases of rape and other forms of sexual violence against numerous detained protesters, suggests that the cases documented are part of a systematic approach.
Sixteen of the 45 survivors mentioned in the report were raped, including six women, seven men, a 14-year-old girl and two boys aged 16 and 17. Six of them – four women and two men – were raped by groups of up to 10 male security guards.
Security forces raped women and girls vaginally, anally and orally, and men and boys were raped anally. Survivors were raped with wooden and metal rods, glass bottles, tubes and/or sexual organs and fingers by security forces. Violations occurred in detention centers and police cars, as well as in schools or residential buildings that were illegally converted into detention centers.
Amnesty International also documented the cases of 29 survivors who were subjected to forms of sexual violence other than rape. In these cases, survivors were brutally groped or beaten by members of the security forces, punched and kicked in these areas of the body and/or forced to completely undress, sometimes in front of video cameras. Men’s testicles were abused with electric shocks, needles, or ice; women’s hair was cut against their will and/or their hair was brutally pulled. Survivors also received threats that they and/or their family members would be raped.