Iran Authorities Arrest Over 100 In Iranian Schoolgirls Poisoning Case

Over 100 people have been arrested by the Iranian authorities in connection to the poisoning of schoolgirls in the country. As per reports, the people involved have been "identified, arrested, and investigated" in several cities of the country including Tehran.

According to a statement from Iran's Interior Ministry, initial inquiries revealed that many of them influenced by the psychological atmosphere, indulged in the crime out of mischief or adventurism aiming to shut down schools. They had apparently used harmless and smelly substances.

On February 26, Iran's deputy minister said that "some people" were poisoning schoolgirls in the city of Qom in order to prevent girls from obtaining an education, according to state media.

Hundreds of cases of respiratory poisoning among schoolgirls in Qom and south of Tehran have been reported since late November. Some required hospital treatments. The deliberate poisoning was caused by some chemical compounds.

Iran has been witnessing a wave of suspected poisoning among schoolgirls in the past few months. The first identified incident happened on November 30 in the city of Qom, where about 50 girls fell ill and were rushed to the hospital.

Iran Schoolgirls Poisoned

Deputy health minister Younes Panahi on Sunday implicitly confirmed that the poisoning was deliberate. "After numerous students in the schools at Qom were poisoned, it was discovered that some people wanted all schools, especially girls' schools, to be shut down," said Panahi, as quoted by the IRNA state news agency.

However, he didn’t elaborate, and there haven’t been any arrests made so far with regard to the poisonings. According to the IRNA, parents of students who became ill gathered outside the city's governorate on February 14 to demand an explanation from authorities.

The next day, Ali Bahadori Jahromi, the government spokesperson, stated that the intelligence and education ministers were trying to find the cause of the poisonings. Last week, prosecutor general Mohammad Jafar Montazeri ordered a judicial probe into the matter.

The poisonings come as a result of many protests happening in Iran since the custodial death of 22-year-old Iranian Kurd Mahsa Amini on December 16, 2022, for alleged violations of the country’s strict dress code for women.

Even as the country witnesses massive anti-hijab protests, Iran continues to curb the rights of women by poisoning schoolgirls to stop them from pursuing education.

Anti-Hijab Protest In Iran

At an event in Tehran, Iran, an engineer marched onstage wearing a stylish shirt paired with tight pants while holding a microphone in one hand. She had her long brown hair tied in a ponytail and let it swing freely behind her, uncovered, in defiance of Iran's strict hijab law.

She identified herself as Zeinab Kazempour at the convention of Iran's professional association of engineers. She condemned the group for supporting the country's hijab rule and strode off the stage, removing a scarf from her neck and tossing it on the floor under a huge image of Iran's leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei.

The people gathered at the auditorium clapped, cheered, and whistled in appreciation of her act. A video of the same went viral on social media and local news websites. Kazempour becomes the latest champion for many Iranians in the growing open challenge to the hijab law in Iran.

Suggested Reading: A Feminist Revolution Like No Other: Iranian Women’s Fight Against Historical Oppression