Iranian authorities have arrested 110 people on suspicion of being linked to suspected poisonings at girls schools that have hospitalised hundreds of students since November.
Saeed Montazeralmahdi, a spokesman for the police command, said the arrests were the result of an increase in police foot patrols around affected institutions, the semi-official Mehr News Agency reported.
Iranian girls are hospitalised after poisoning.Credit:Iran International
A spate of mass illnesses has spread through hundreds of schools over the past few months, with teachers and students reporting the presence of noxious gas and smells that have caused vomiting and nausea. That’s coincided with the biggest popular uprising against the Islamic Republic’s theocratic leadership since it was founded after the 1979 revolution – with women and girls playing a central role.
The protests followed the death in police custody of 22-year-old Mahsa Amini, a Kurdish woman who was arrested for allegedly flouting Islamic dress codes.
Female students have staged classroom protests rebuking the male clerics that run the country. Several teenage girls have been beaten to death by security forces, according to the United Nations and several rights groups.
Iranian women shop without wearing their mandatory Islamic headscarves in a commercial district in northern Tehran, in November.Credit:AP
Montazeralmahdi didn’t give details about the people arrested or if the police had determined the chemicals used. He said “stink bombs” had been deployed in some cases and that a number of cases were the result of “psychological factors” rather than poisoning.
Arrests weren’t made until Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei spoke publicly to condemn the attacks for the first time last week.
The government has heavily restricted independent media and arrested dozens of journalists since the outbreak of nationwide protests in September. It has also targeted reporters covering the poisonings, even as officials have provided few details about what is happening.
An MP on a government panel investigating the incidents said earlier this month that as many as 5000 students have complained of being sickened in 230 schools across 25 provinces. Human Rights Activists in Iran, a group that has closely monitored the recent protests, has put the number at more than 7000 students, AP reported.
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