Unknown people set fire to the office facade of an ultra-conservative Iranian lawmaker who recently criticized anti-government protests in 2019, a local agency reported on Saturday.
Iran was shaken in November 2019 by several days of protest triggered by the announcement of a rise in the price of gasoline and which had been violently repressed according to human rights organizations.
"
The facade of the office of Hodjatoleslam
[intermediate rank in the hierarchy of the Shiite clergy, Editor's note]
Hassan Norouzi, elected from the constituency of Robat-Karim
(in the south of Tehran)
, was set on fire Friday evening by unknown persons
", the conservative agency Fars said.
The attack came a week after the publication of remarks by the MP who was fiercely hostile to the 2019 protests.
Read alsoMovements of protest: "In the Middle East, Iran's policy is weakened"
The Iranian authorities had spoken at the time of 230 people killed while a group of experts working for the UN had reported more than 400 dead. “
I was one of those shooting people. We killed. Who today dares to judge us in court?
", Hassan Norouzi had said in an interview, criticizing a recent"
trial
"held in London by opponents. The virulence of this statement has been strongly criticized in Iran, including by the ultra-conservative media. "
Norouzi declared that the interview had been distorted, while admitting to having made these remarks
", wrote the daily Javan. The Fars agency denounced an "
incredible
"
statement
.
Denouncing the lack of a trial in Iran for the perpetrators of the repression of the protests, Iranian opponents in exile and human rights organizations held a symbolic trial in London in mid-November to try them.
During the 2019 protests, police stations were attacked, shops looted, banks and gas stations burned down, and authorities denounced a “
plot
” hatched abroad.