Canada says it has imposed sanctions on 12 senior officials from Iran's Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) and Law Enforcement Forces for their role in "gross and systematic human rights violations."
In a statement Canada's foreign ministry announced on Monday that the targeted officials include Kurdistan Province Governor Esmaeil Zarei Kousha and Morteza Mir Aghaei, Commander of Basij paramilitary forces in Sanandaj, Kurdistan Province.
The measures prohibit dealings with the listed individuals, effectively freezing any assets they may hold in Canada.
They are also inadmissible to Canada under the Immigration and Refugee Protection Act, added the statement.
“Ottawa will continue to coordinate with its international partners to respond to the Iranian regime’s egregious treatment of its people, its deployment of propaganda and its actions that continue to threaten international peace and stability.”
Mélanie Joly, Minister of Foreign Affairs of Canada earlier stated that “The Iranian regime continues to brutally oppress its people and to deny them their fundamental rights and freedoms. We hear the pleas of the Iranian people, and we commend them for their bravery and resilience. Canada will not stop advocating for Iranians and their human rights.”
Iran’s suppression of nationwide protests since the death in custody of Mahsa Amini in September has drawn condemnation from international community with US and EU imposing sanctions on the regime.
Iranian government officials, experts and the regime’s opponents have long argued that economic sanctions imposed by the Trump administration since 2018 inflicted a serious blow to Iran’s weak economy, but few have ventured to quantify the impact.
What is clear now is that Iran’s oil-dependent currency, the rial, fell from 35,000 to more than 600,000 against the US dollar in exactly five years. This led to very high inflation, officially at more than 50 percent, which has impoverished tens of millions of Iranians. But how much of the bad news was the result of sanctions and how much was the outcome of a natural trend in Iran’s state-controlled and inefficient economy.
Masoud Nili, an economist in Tehran believes that the impact of sanctions on the fall of the rial has been significant and serious. In a television program reported by Roouydad24 news website. Nili said that if the United States had not withdrawn from the JCPOA nuclear deal and imposed sanctions, the rial would be probably trading at 100,000 against the US dollar, instead of 600,000 and counting.
The economist based his estimate on trends since at least 2000 and concluded that the rial would have lost value in the past 5 years, but at a manageable pace.
Iran’s currency was trading at 70 to the dollar right before the 1979 revolution but in the 44 years since the establishment of the Islamic Republic it has steadily declined and now is headed toward a 10,000-fold fall in value.
But in Nili’s estimate, without the ‘Trump’s sanctions’ the Islamic Republic would have faced rial’s natural fall and not a catastrophic decline that it cannot control now.
The economist had a similar appraisal of the rate of inflation. Looking at trends in more than two decades he argued that the average annual inflation rate was around 16 percent, except in the past five years. The latest official figures put the inflation rate at more than 50 percent for January 2023, although there are no independent estimates.
Nili argued that the difference between the 16 percent average since the year 2000 and the current inflation rate is because of US sanctions.
But that difference is exactly what made the current situation an hyper-crisis instead of a weak economy limping along with the steady income from oil exports.
The Biden administration that assumed office criticizing the its predecessor’s decision to withdraw from the 2015 nuclear accord, also argued that sanctions have been ineffective and Tehran has expanded its nuclear program instead of making any concessions.
Critics on the other hand argued that sanctions take time to leave a serious impact and those imposed on Iran would have hardly worked in just two years from 2018-2020.
As the Biden administration entered talks with Tehran in April 2020 to revive the JCPOA, it did not suspend Trump’s sanctions and Iran struggled to sell oil and engage in in international trade. After depleting its foreign currency reserves, the economic situation began to quickly deteriorate, especially as optimism disappeared in the latter part of 2022 in the absence of a new nuclear deal with the US.
Sparked by International Mother Language Day, February 21, some speakers of Iran’s many languages including Turki, Kurdish, Balochi and Arabic, are demanding access to education in their native languages.
Heated discussions have flooded social media, especially among the opposition, with allegations of separatism for the government's policy to enforce only Persian language education.
Proponents of education in mother language argue that teaching only in Persian is detrimental to the development of many children whose mother language is different. Some suggest it can cause psychological pressures on young children when they begin their education, hindering their progress.
In a paper presented to the Second Development and Educational Equality Conference in 2016, prominent economist Mohsen Renani said over 65 percent of the children who had to repeat the first and second years of school were from nine provinces where the first language is not Persian.
“By forcing education in Persian, we reduce the speed of mental and personal development of around half of the country’s population and deprive them of opportunities in favor of Persian-speaking children,” Renani wrote. In the absence of any official data, Renani estimated the total population of non-Persian speakers between 42 to 49 percent of all Iranians.
Article 15 of the Constitution of the Islamic Republic recognizes Persian as the “official language and script of Iran, the lingua franca of its people.” However, it also recognizes the the use of “regional and tribal languages in the press and mass media, as well as for teaching of their literature in schools.”
Some of the programs of the state broadcaster’s local stations are broadcast in other languages including Turki and Kurdish, Arabic and Gilaki but none of the many languages of Iran are allowed to be taught in schools, whether public or private, despite the Constitution. Learning classical Arabic, however, is compulsory after primary education on religious grounds.
Authorities often shut down cultural and literary societies formed to promote other languages and teachers such as Zahra Mohammadi, a Kurdish language teacher, are often prosecuted on charges of acting against national security. Mohammadi who was serving a five-year sentence was recently released from prison.
The regime is particularly strict about the teaching of languages that are spoken in peripheral areas of the country such as Kurdish and Turki and accuses those who promote these languages of separatism.
Restrictions do not only affect teaching of other languages and publication in those languages. Names can only be chosen from a list of approved Persian and Arabic (religious) names. Mahsa Amini, whose death in custody sparked the recent months of unrest, was named Jina by her family but her birth certificate had to be issued as Mahsa.
A survey by Gamaan Institute a year ago found that 85% of respondents considered Farsi (Persian) as the most appropriate official or common language for Iran and 65% agree that schools should teach native languages in addition to Farsi while 19% of respondents disapproved of this option. On the other hand, 61% disagreed with the statement “I prefer my child to receive higher education in their native language rather than in Farsi”, while 18% agreed.
The survey was carried out between February 17-27, 2022. Over 20,000 respondents over the age of 19 participated in this study. The final sample used in the report consisted of 16,850 Iranians living inside Iran.
