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Foreign Minister Annalena Baerbock: "Talk very quickly about further consequences".
Photo: SEDAT SUNA/EPA
After the violent suppression of dissident demonstrations in Iran, Federal Foreign Minister Annalena Baerbock called for new sanctions against the country.
"In the EU circle, we will now have to talk very quickly about further consequences, which for me also includes sanctions against those responsible," said the Green politician of the German Press Agency in Berlin.
"The attempt to suppress peaceful protests with even more deadly force must not go unanswered," she added.
"Women's rights are the indicator of the state of a society," Baerbock said in justification.
"If women are not safe in a country, no one is safe." The Iranian ambassador was summoned to the Foreign Office for Monday afternoon.
Thousands of people took to the streets in Iran at the weekend against the Islamic system of rule and the systematic discrimination against women.
The trigger is the death of 22-year-old Iranian Mahsa Amini, who was arrested by the vice squad for violating the strict Islamic dress code.
During her visit to the UN General Assembly, Baerbock said last week that Germany would bring the Amini case before the UN Human Rights Council.
Security forces have been cracking down on the protests for days.
According to official figures, 41 people have been killed so far, human rights groups speak of a higher number of victims.
Union criticizes the long silence of the traffic light government
The Union faction in the Bundestag has condemned the violent suppression of dissident demonstrations in Iran and at the same time criticized the traffic light coalition.
Foreign policy spokesman Jürgen Hardt said on Monday that the CDU/CSU parliamentary group was dismayed by the extent of the violence used by the Iranian regime against peaceful demonstrators.
"It's mainly women who are taking to the streets for their rights." This makes it all the more incomprehensible that leading politicians in the traffic light government have largely remained silent about the brutal actions of the Tehran leadership.
“If there was a reason to breathe life into feminist foreign policy, it would be now,” said Hardt.
The women's protests in Iran are a harsh reality check for Foreign Minister Baerbock and the traffic light coalition partners.
muk/dpa
