At least 11 Kurdish citizens were shot dead by Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) forces during the protests in Eslamabad-e Gharb, Kermanshah Province, on the evening of 8 January, the Kurdistan Human Rights Network (KHRN) has learned.
The ongoing protests have been met with heavy and bloody repression by military and security forces in recent weeks. According to multiple reports, dozens of protesters were killed in the city, with many more injured, and a large number of arrests have been made.
KHRN has verified the identities of 11 people killed: Sajjad Kiani, a dentist; Milad Ganj-Doust, a 26-year-old nurse; Jaaber Abdi, 20; Reza Darvishi, 27; Milad Farrokhi, a father of two; Masoud Sahami; Navid Mirzaei; Amir-Hossein Naderi; Javad Niazi; Farshid Shekar-Sokhan; and Javad Askari.
Five other protesters – Holakou Eyvani, Amir-Ali Jalilian, Shirzad Balaei, Fardin Fouladi and Amir Naderi – had previously been identified as having lost their lives during the Eslamabad-e Gharb protests.
Following this, security forces pressured some families to blame Kurdish opposition parties for the shootings.
Military and security forces also carried out repeated raids on Eslamabad-e Gharb hospital, particularly on 8 and 9 January, in attempts to detain injured protesters. As a result, many families secretly removed the wounded or the bodies of those killed to prevent their detention.
In most cases, families were denied permission to bury their relatives in the city’s cemetery and were forced to transfer the bodies to surrounding villages for burial.
Based on the information obtained, the funerals of Amir-Hossein Naderi in the village of Zavareh Kuh, Javad Niazi in the village of Ban Ganjab, Navid Mirzaei in Emamzadeh Hassan, Milad Ganj-Doust in the village of Seyyed Ayaz, and Milad Farrokhi in the village of Vanayi were held on 10 and 11 January.
No information has so far been obtained about funeral ceremonies for the other killed individuals.
The KHRN has also received additional names of individuals reportedly killed during the Eslamabad-e Gharb protests, and is in the process of verifying this information.
