A senior adviser to Molavi Abdolhamid, a spiritual leader for Iran’s Sunni Muslim population, has been arrested amid months of unrest in Iran sparked by the death of a young woman while she was detained by the notorious morality police for an alleged dress code violation.
According to Haalvsh, a group that monitors rights violations of the Sunni minority in Iran, Molavi Abdulmajid was arrested on January 30 in the southeastern Iranian city of Zahedan and transferred a day later to a prison in the city of Mashhad. The relatives of the cleric have been told to follow up on his situation "with the Special Clerical Court," the report adds.
The state news agency IRNA confirmed Abdulmajid's arrest and quoted an informed source saying he was accused of "numerous communications with foreign people and media, and distorting public opinion."
Zahedan has been a hotbed for unrest since the death of 22-year-old Mahsa Amini, who was in police custody for allegedly wearing her head scarf improperly. The protests grew even larger following the news of the alleged sexual assault of a 15-year-old girl by the Chabahar police commander.
On September 30, people in the southeastern Iranian city took to the streets demanding accountability. They were met with a violent and bloody response from security forces that had become known as Bloody Friday. Almost 100 people were killed and hundreds more injured in the clash.
In a January 19 interview with RFE/RL’s Radio Farda, Abdulmajid criticized the government for creating an atmosphere of insecurity in Zahedan and said the protests in the city will continue "until the issue of Bloody Friday and the people of Zahedan who were killed and injured is resolved."
Abdolhamid had said previously that senior officials, including Khamenei, were "responsible" for the killing of protesters during the so-called Bloody Friday massacre. He also called for an immediate referendum with the presence of international observers to "change policies based on the wishes of the people."
The Iranian government has unleashed a brutal crackdown on weeks of unrest -- one of the deepest challenges to the Islamic regime since the revolution in 1979 -- that erupted following the September 16 death of Amini.
Sunni Muslims make up the majority of the population in Sistan-Baluchistan Province in southeastern Iran where Abdolhamid is based but account for only about 10 percent of the population in Shi'a-dominated Iran overall.
Since Amini's death, more than 500 people have been killed in the police crackdown, according to rights groups. Several thousand more have been arrested, including many protesters, as well as journalists, lawyers, activists, digital rights defenders, and others.