Iranian police have been filmed brutally beating up a protester before shooting him at close range.
The video, widely circulated online, shows a man being kicked and beaten by a group of officers wearing helmets holding batons, while dozens of officers on motorcycles crawl through a small road at night. As the officers continue to beat the man, they drag him off the street and into an underpass.
An officer then rams his motorcycle into the helpless man lying on the ground and knocks him over. Another officer with a rifle then shoots the protester.
The identity and condition of the protester is unknown.
Iranian authorities continue to crack down on anti-regime demonstrations across the country sparked by the death of Mahsa Amini.
Dozens of police officers on motorcycles have been filmed beating up the protester as he lay helpless on the ground.
A police officer on a motorcycle hits the man while other officers kick and punch the man.
Dozens of police officers on motorcycles crawl across a road in Tehran, who in turn punch and kick the protester.
Other motorcyclists passing by get out of their vehicles to wave their batons at the man who isn’t moving.
Another man with a rifle approaches the man lying on the ground. The man initially tries to cover his head with his hands before the sound of a gunshot is heard. His motionless body is then abandoned.
The video was shot at night with a mobile phone, allegedly in a district of Tehran.
Iranian authorities said on Wednesday they have since ordered an investigation into the video showing officers brutally beating up the protester.
Human rights groups said this exposed the sheer brutality of Iran’s police repression against protesters.
The nationwide protests were sparked by the death of Mahsa Amini, who died in custody after being beaten and arrested by Tehran’s notorious ‘morality police’ for not wearing the hijab in accordance with government standards.
The nationwide protests are seen as the biggest challenge to the Islamic Republic’s leadership since the 1979 revolution.
Dozens of Iranian officers walk past the man, taking turns hitting him.
The video shows the man being brutally beaten by Iranian protesters before being shot, allegedly filmed in Tehran.
The man lies motionless on the ground after being run over in an underpass in Tehran overnight and shot by Iranian officers.
Activists say dozens have been killed and thousands arrested in a crackdown by the security forces accused of shooting protesters at close range, beating them with batons and other abuses.
Human rights group Amnesty International said: “This shocking video sent from Tehran is another horrifying reminder that the brutality of Iran’s security forces knows no bounds.
“Amid a crisis of impunity, they are being given a free hand to brutally beat and shoot protesters,” it added, calling on the UN Human Rights Council to “examine these crimes as a matter of urgency.”
Iranian police said in a statement from the state news agency IRNA that the order had been issued to “examine the exact time and place of the incident and identify the perpetrators.”
Mahsa Amini, 22, was killed in September by the Islamic Republic’s so-called vice squad and beaten for not wearing the hijab in accordance with government standards.
Parmis Hamnava (left) and Sadaf Movahedi (right) are just two of many young women beaten to death by Iranian security forces.
“The police absolutely do not condone violent and unconventional behavior and will treat the perpetrators according to the rules,” the statement said.
The emergence of this video follows the deaths of many other protesters demonstrating against the regime.
Iranian security forces killed schoolgirl Parmis Hamnava last week after she tore portraits of the founder of the Islamic Republic from her schoolbooks. Sadaf Movahedi was also beaten to death on Monday night for walking home from school during protests for women’s rights in Iran.
According to an updated toll issued Wednesday by the Norway-based Iran Human Rights NGO, 176 people have died in the crackdown on protests sparked by Amini’s death.
Another 101 people have been killed in an apparent wave of protests in Zahedan in southeastern Sistan-Baluchistan province.
IHR has warned that these numbers are a minimum, as information flows slowly due to internet disruptions by authorities.
Thousands of people have been arrested across the country in cracking down on protests, human rights activists say, while the Iranian judiciary has said 1,000 people have already been charged in what it describes as “riots.”
The trial of five men charged with offenses that could carry the death penalty over the protests opened in Tehran on Saturday.
“Instead of accepting people’s legal demands, the Islamic republic is acting with repressive measures and show trials,” said IHR director Mahmood Amiry-Moghaddam.
“The charges and sentences have no legal validity and their sole purpose is to perpetrate more violence and create social fear,” he added.
The nationwide protests have been fueled by anger at Iran’s strict Islamic dress code for women, enforced by the police who arrested Amini.
Although there have been protests in Iran for the past two decades, the current movement has regularly broken taboos, united social classes and spread largely across the country.