PARIS: Iranian authorities have arrested a niece of supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei after she recorded a video describing the authorities led by her uncle as a “murderous and child-killing regime”.

Farideh Moradkhani comes from a branch of the family that has a record of opposition to Iran’s clerical leadership and has herself been jailed previously in the country. Her brother Mahmoud Moradkhani wrote on Twitter that she was arrested on Wednesday after going to the office of the prosecutor following a summons.

Then on Saturday her brother posted a video on YouTube, with the link shared on Twitter, where she condemned the “clear and obvious oppression” Iranians have been subjected to, and criticised the international community’s inaction.

“Free people, be with us! Tell your governments to stop supporting this murderous and child-killing regime,” she said. “This regime is not loyal to any of its religious principles and does not know any law or rule except force and maintaining its power in any way possible.” It was not clear when the video had been recorded.

She complained that the sanctions imposed against the regime over its crackdown were “laughable” and said Iranians had been left “alone” in their fight for freedom.

Moradkhani is the daughter of Khamenei’s sister Badri who fell out with her family in the 1980s and fled to Iraq at the peak of the war with Iran’s neighbour.

Death penalty

An Iranian rapper who expressed support for anti-regime protests is charged with “corruption on earth” and could face the death penalty, judicial authorities confirmed on Sunday.

A US-based rights group had tweeted on Saturday that Toomaj Salehi’s trial had begun “without a lawyer of his choice”, and his family said his “life is at serious risk”.

“The trial has not yet begun but the charge against Toomaj Salehi has been drafted and sent back” to the court in Isfahan, said Assadollah Jafari, judicial chief in the central province, according to the judiciary’s Mizan Online website.

Published in Dawn, November 28th, 2022