Washington —
Ongoing anti-government protests in Iran since the death in September of 22-year-old Mahsa Amini while in police custody have drawn worldwide attention. Iran’s president has pledged an investigation into her death, but that has done little to appease demonstrators who continue to denounce Iran’s leadership and its laws requiring women to completely cover their hair in public.
In the weeks since Amini’s death, security forces using live rounds and tear gas have failed to put down the demonstrations. New U.S. sanctions have targeted security forces blamed for cracking down on the protesters.
In an interview with VOA’s Kurdish Service, U.S. Senator Chris Van Hollen, a Democratic member of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, talked about how the United States is approaching the situation in Iran, Iranian officials’ accusations that Washington is helping to orchestrate the protests, the status of ongoing nuclear talks with Tehran, as well as recent Iranian attacks in the Kurdistan Region of Iraq.
The interview has been edited for clarity and brevity.
U.S. President Biden on Monday issued a statement condemning the continued violence against peaceful protesters in Iran, saying more measures will be taken this week against perpetrators of violence. Do you know what these new measures might be?
I don't know the specifics of the new measures, but this, of course, all has grown out of the outrageous killing of Mahsa Amini. And the Biden administration has already taken actions against the so-called morality police and others involved in the crackdowns against peaceful protesters. So, I believe what the Biden administration will continue to do is look for entities that are part of this network that [are] cracking down on peaceful protests and doing so in such a brutal way.
Do you think these actions are enough? Are there any more practical steps that the United States can take to support the protest movement?
Well, the United States is trying to take a two-pronged approach here. First is to hold accountable and sanction those involved in cracking down on peaceful protesters, and they will continue to look for ways to do that. There are already lots of sanctions that have been applied to Iran and its economy, but they're trying to target these sanctions in a way to hold people accountable for cracking down on peaceful protests.
The other, of course, is trying to find more ways to get information — independent factual information — to the people of Iran. That's why the Biden administration . There are, of course, issues and challenges with getting some of that equipment in Iran. But we are working with partners around the world and especially in the region to try to better position our information communication devices so that they can get through to the Iranian people.
Iran's supreme leader Ali Khamenei and other Iranian officials have accused the United States and Israel of planning these protests.
Well, that's laughable. You know, Iran has a habit of pointing fingers at other people when they need to be looking in the mirror, because the killing of Mahsa Amini was at the hands of the Iranian regime and the morality police, and no effort to point fingers at anybody else is going to take that away. And these protests are a natural result of the supreme deprivation of people's basic human rights. And you've got a regime that continues to crack down on those human rights to deprive women of essential freedoms. And so, it's natural that you would have this kind of reaction from people who want to be free and want to be able to express themselves freely.
These are some of the biggest protests inside Iran for years. Do you think this is the time for the United States to sit down with anti-government opposition groups to look for alternatives? Because this could, at some point, lead to some [greater political impact] inside Iran?
Well, I think the United States keeps an open line of communication with civil society within Iran to the extent that we are able to communicate with civil society groups within Iran. If you're asking me about whether or not the administration should adopt a policy of overt regime change, I think that the administration is pursuing the right course at the current time. And if you look at the situation on the ground, I do think that the Biden administration is responding as they should and need to.
If the United States is going to support the people of Iran, would helping them overthrow this regime be one of the options?