The poisoning of students in girls’ schools, which started on November 30 in Qom, affecting 12 schools and soon spread to Chaharmahal Bakhtiari and Tehran, extended this week to schools in Borujerd and Isfahan. On Tuesday evening, 20 students at Ahmadiyeh High School in Borujerd were poisoned and taken to the hospital. The second incident was reported to the emergency department on Wednesday morning from the same high school, but this time the number of poisoned students was 62, according to the state-run news website Hamshahri on February 23.
Two and a half months after the serial poisoning of girl students in Qom and after continuous denials and the publication of false reports, Mohammad Jafar Montazeri, the Prosecutor General of the regime, wrote, according to state-run media, to the Qom prosecutor on February 20: Some news reports point to a worrying trend of a kind of poisoning in some educational centers in Qom pointing to the possibility of intentional criminal actions…”
All the evidence points out that the target is girl students, and the ruling criminal gangs use these heinous actions as a substitute or supplement for the so-called ‘Guidance Patrol’ to create terror among people, especially women, and to prevent them from participating in uprisings and social protests.
The Public Relations Director of Qom Education said, “About 10 or 11 schools were affected, of which only one was a boy school, and the rest were girl schools.” The extent of the poisoning was such that Qom schools were closed on February 7 and 8 due to protests by families of students.
In the past two and a half months, the regime officials denied or lied about these poisonings in various ways. State-run website Donyaye Eghtesad, February 15, quoted Minister of Education Youssef Nouri as saying, “Major part of the poisoning of students in Qom is caused by rumors that have scared people and students. We received reports from the competent authorities, who said there is no issue… Some students had gone to the hospital. Some of them, because they suffered from chronic diseases, the doctors kept them in the hospital”. The same website reported on February 6 that Siamak Mohebi, vice president of Qom University of Medical Sciences, had claimed “the cause of these incidents is rapid respiration of the female students and their stress” and added: “The blood samples of the students were normal.” Mohsen Safai Farahani, a member of the regime’s parliament, said: “This has been exaggerated.”
The controversy grew to the extent that Donyaye Eghtesad wrote on February 10: “Bitter and suspicious poisonings in the schools of Qom Province remind people of the incident of acid attacks (on women) in Isfahan, the case of which has not yet been determined and the victims are still in limbo.”
The Women’s Committee of the National Council of Resistance of Iran condemns these criminal actions and once again renews the call by Mrs. Maryam Rajavi for the intervention of the United Nations Fact-Finding Mission in this regard and emphasizes that the ongoing tragedy of the poisoning of innocent girls in Qom would not be possible without the active involvement of the IRGC or the Ministry of Intelligence and Other state bodies.
National Council of Resistance of Iran (NCRI) – Women’s Committee
February 23, 2023
