Iran: Finger-pointing grows over poisonings of schoolgirls

But many Iranians point the finger at the country’s authorities, believing they are out to intimidate young women, many of whom have been at the forefront of months-long mass protests against the clerical regime in Iran.

Under the rallying cry: “Woman, Life, Freedom”, girls have staged ­protests in their schools and removed their ­mandatory headscarves. These protests in turn have widened, laying down the ­biggest opposition challenge to the ­Tehran regime in years.

Whoever lies behind the actions it’s ­estimated that at least 900 girls have been poisoned in a series of bizarre gas attacks on schools across the Islamic Republic.

The poison attacks at more than 30 schools in at least four cities started in ­November in Iran’s Shi’ite Muslim holy city of Qom, prompting some ­parents to take their children out of school.

There in the heartland of Shi’ite ­theologians and pilgrims, students at the Noor ­Yazdanshahr Conservatory fell ill in ­November. They then fell ill again in ­December.

Many of the poisoned have ­suffered ­respiratory problems, nausea, ­dizziness, and fatigue, with some students ­experiencing temporary paralysis of their limbs and social media posts showing girls hospitalised.

According to the New York-based ­Centre for Human Rights in Iran (CHRI), at least one girl has died but the Iranian authorities have denied reports that the death of 11-year-old Fatemeh Rezaei was linked to the poisonings.

Those students affected have ­often ­reported strange odours prior to ­falling sick, saying they smell like rotten ­tangerines, a strong perfume, chlorine, or cleaning agents. Some local media have cited students as saying they saw ­unidentified objects being thrown into schoolyards before a poisoning.

Iranian MP Alireza Monadi said the substances used included N2 gas, which he said quickly disappeared from the body and hence made a diagnosis difficult.

But some authorities have dismissed the attacks insisting the schoolgirls have ­panicked or put it down to mass ­hysteria. Last week, however, a deputy health ­minister, Younes Panahi, became the first official to confirm that the ­poisonings have been deliberate.

He told state-linked media that “some people” wish to stop girls from going to school. He did not elaborate.

With the authorities under ­increasing pressure, President Raisi has urged the interior ministry to investigate and find “the roots” of the attacks but ­frustration over official explanations ­remains high.

“Officials are giving contradictory ­statements ... one says it is intentional, ­another says it is security-linked and ­another official blames it on schools’ ­heating systems,” Iran’s state media ­quoted senior cleric Mohammad Javad Tabatabai-Borujerdi as saying. “Such statements increase people’s mistrust ­(towards the establishment).”

Iran’s Fars news agency, a hard-line news outlet, said the poisonings were a conspiracy by the opposition based ­outside the country to provoke “the silent majority” who did not participate in the street protests but could join a new wave of demonstrations calling for a revolution.

Suspicions though have largely ­fallen on hard-line groups that operate as the ­self-declared guardians of their ­interpretation of Islam. Some have drawn parallels with the Taliban’s attacks in the 2000s and 2010s to poison schoolgirls in Afghanistan to try to keep them from ­receiving an education.

In Iran itself back in 2014, people took to the streets of the city of Isfahan after a wave of acid attacks, which ­appeared to be aimed at terrorising women who violated the country’s strict Islamic dress code.

“If operatives of the acid attacks had been identified and punished then, ­today a group of reactionaries would not have ganged up on our innocent girls in the schools,” reformist politician Azar ­Mansoori recently tweeted, echoing the views of many Iranians.

Some human rights activists maintain the root cause though lies in the nature of the authoritarian clerical regime that rules the country.

“The deliberate poisoning of schoolgirls in Iran is exposing the fanatical, lawless and violent mentality that is resurfacing under this unaccountable government, which is trying to force the entire country, especially women, backwards,” said Hadi Ghaemi, executive director of CHRI.

For now, as the evidence of ­deliberate poisoning grows, the culprits behind the attacks remain unidentified. But many Iranians are convinced they have not heard the last from whoever is ­responsible for this shadowy and sinister campaign.

Ukraine: Battle for Bakhmut buys time as Russian ‘pincers’ close

FOR some time, its imminent capture has been heralded by Moscow. This weekend, as Russian artillery continued to pound the last routes out of the besieged Ukrainian city of Bakhmut, the Kremlin was once again beginning to crow of its first major victory in half a year after the bloodiest battle of the war.

But even as I write, Ukrainian officials are still insisting that numerous Russian attacks over the past few days are continuing to be repelled.

Yesterday, Reuters news agency reported that Ukrainian soldiers were working to repair damaged roads and more troops were heading toward the frontline in a sign that Ukraine was not yet ready to give up the city. In one of its recent intelligence briefings, the UK Ministry of Defence said the winter thaw is turning ground into mud, limiting cross-country movement so it can be a “military advantage to defending forces”.

That said, Ukraine’s Western allies have been telling Ukraine to retreat from the city, saying it’s as good as lost and no longer worth the fight. Ukrainian forces, though, remain doggedly dug, as they have for over six months, in this, the hottest spot on the Donbas front, and making their Russian adversaries pay for every yard of ground taken.

The outlook though remains a tough one for the Ukrainians who have always insisted that Bakhmut has little intrinsic strategic value but that the huge Russian losses there could determine the course of the war.

But victory in Bakhmut, pyrrhic or otherwise, would give Russia the first major prize of a costly winter offensive after it called up hundreds of thousands of reservists last year.

Sensing this, Moscow and its forces in the shape of the Russian regular army and Wagner Group mercenaries, are preparing to make the most of any breakthrough in Bakhmut.

“Units of the private military company Wagner have practically surrounded Bakhmut,” Wagner boss Yevgeny Prigozhin said in a video that press agency Reuters determined was filmed on a rooftop in a village some four miles north of the city centre.

“Only one route (out) is left,” he said. “The pincers are closing.”

Reuters also reported that Robert Brovdi, the commander of a Ukrainian drone unit active in Bakhmut who goes by the name “Madyar”, said in a video posted on social media that his unit had been ordered to withdraw immediately.

He said he had been fighting there for 110 days.

Meanwhile, Volodymyr Nazarenko, a deputy commander in the National Guard of Ukraine, told Ukrainian NV Radio the situation was “critical”, with fighting “round the clock”.

Much of what is going on in and around Bakhmut at the moment appears from a Ukrainian perspective to be about buying time, allowing for the resupply of ammunition from Western allies and the deployment of tanks and other promised weaponry.

Should the city fall, then Ukrainian forces will likely fall back to the next line of prepared defences between Bakhmut and Slovyansk.

This, though, will not stop the Kremlin from making much of it taking Bakhmut and presenting its fall as a victory to its citizens – many more of whom it will likely need to mobilise in the weeks and months ahead.

Estonia: Kallas navigates tricky general election fight

ONE of Europe ’s most staunchly pro-Ukrainian governments goes to the polls today in a general election that will be far from plain sailing.

Estonia’s Prime Minister Kaja Kallas’s liberal Reform party faces a challenge from the far-right EKRE party that is seeking to capitalise on dissatisfaction with the rising cost of living.

“I hope to stay prime minister, but it’s up to the voters to decide,” Kallas said in an interview, after casting an early vote online, as the majority of Estonians are expected to do.

While the unlikely outcome of the election producing a coalition led by the EKRE remains a possibility – even if Kallas pledged she would never work with them – the result will probably see her through safely. Ahead of today’s election Kallas’ Reform party was topping polls, although the gap with second-placed EKRE has narrowed in recent weeks.

EKRE’s popularity surged during the Covid-19 pandemic and benefitted from Estonia’s inflation reaching 23% inflation last summer, the highest in the Eurozone and more than double its average.

EKRE leader Martin Helme, who has vouched to continue supporting Ukraine, has however said that under his watch, Estonia would not accept any more Ukrainian refugees.

The nation of 1.3 million, of which a quarter are ethnic Russians, accepted 62,000 Ukrainian refugees in 2022 but Helme has said this has put an “enormous strain” on Estonia’s budgets.

During its last period in government, EKRE did little to ingratiate itself with the international community dogged as it was by controversy through party chiefs who had a penchant for insulting world leaders among them US president Joe Biden and Finland’s prime minister Sanna Marin. Kallas knows that the looming presence of the Russian war in Ukraine has far-reaching implications for Estonia and its neighbours. She has been one of the most high-profile leaders from the Nato states that border Russia and has frequently mentioned her concerns over appeasement.

“We are supporting the open, friendly, European-minded, smart country, I would say, and EKRE is looking more into itself, that we should stick to our own interest, not to help Ukraine,” she said recently. She has even gone as far as to accuse EKRE of espousing such a narrative by saying it favoured neutrality rather than supporting Ukraine or Russia. Today’s election will decide whether the country agrees with her. Ukraine and its allies will no doubt also be watching closely.

Italy: Schlein’s election means gloves are off between left and right

SHE has been called an “outsider” and often compared to US congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez. But now in what she herself described as a “little big revolution”, Elly Schlein has been elected the new leader of Italy’s Democratic Party, the first time that a woman has led the Italian left.

In what was admittedly something of a surprise win last week, Schlein, a former MEP and Italian-American national, is already being hailed as a breath of fresh air in a party historically dominated by middle-aged men.

In an open primary, the 37-year-old Schlein, the youngest-ever leader, narrowly beat the favourite, Stefano Bonaccini, the more experienced governor of Emilia-Romagna, with 53.8% of the votes against 46.2%, according to final results published by the Italian media last week.

Not everyone, however, is convinced that Schlein’s election is a good thing with some insisting that her unabashedly left-wing agenda could hinder the party’s electoral appeal and would be a sitting target for Italy’s far right.

A measure of what Schlein faces was evident when no sooner in the immediate aftermath of her election victory the right-wing newspaper Il Tempo dubbed her “CommunistElly”.

Schlein is however undaunted. On the evening of her primary win, she declared that the Democratic party was “going to be a big problem for Giorgia Meloni’s government”.

Meloni herself, of course, is the populist right-wing Brothers Of Italy party leader who has been serving as Italy’s prime minister since October last year.

If Schlein’s victory speech is anything to go by, she appears ready to take the political fight to Meloni by “sticking up for the Italy that’s struggling most: the poor who the government is attacking but refuses to see, and exploited, precarious workers”. Schlein declared her party would “take to the barricades” against “cuts and privatisation of universal healthcare”.

But many observers of Italian politics say she has her work cut out in terms of reversing the popular perception of the Democratic Party as aloof and changing its poor electoral fortunes. Right-wing commentators have also already been homing in on Schlein’s background.

“She promised to prioritise the poor, public education and workers… but unlike Meloni, she has never known the poor in her life,” right-wing commentator Italo Bocchino jibed, pointing out how Schlein attended a private school “for rich people” in Switzerland. The gloves, it seems, are off between Schlein and Meloni and interesting times lie ahead in Italian politics.