Tehran on Friday condemned the United Nations Human Rights Council decision to establish an independent investigation into the ongoing deadly violence against protesters in Iran.
Earlier this month, Germany and Iceland submitted a draft resolution to the Council’s member states urging them to set up a fact-finding mission to start investing the ongoing human rights violations.
The resolution was put to a vote on Thursday afternoon and was adopted with 25 votes. Six member states of the Human Rights Council voted against and 16 abstained from the vote.
The vote drew praise from several countries amid an escalatory security campaign employed by Iranian authorities against protesters.
However, Iran's foreign ministry condemned the UN decision to probe the Iranian republic's response to unrest following the death of Mahsa Amini.
Tehran had opposed holding the urgent council session on Thursday as requested by Germany and Iceland.
It “totally rejects” the resolution that was adopted to establish a high-level fact-finding mission, the ministry said in a statement late Thursday.
The foreign ministry also said that Iran had already formed a national commission of inquiry involving legal experts and independent representatives.
“The formation of any new mechanism to examine the incidents over the past two months in Iran is useless and represents a violation of the country's national sovereignty,” it said.
Iran “does not recognize the mission,” the ministry added.
Tehran then blamed Germany and other countries which supported the resolution of making “false and provocative allegations about violating men, women and children's rights, which Iran denies.”
“This resolution was made under pressure from certain political lobbies that depend on false information spread by anti-Iranian media,” the foreign ministry charged.
It denounced a “strategic error by Germany and certain Western countries" and said "this blindness will be detrimental to their interests.”
During Thursday's session, UN rights chief Volker Turk insisted that “the unnecessary and disproportionate use of force must come to an end.”
US Secretary of State Antony Blinken welcomed the vote.
"Today's session leaves no doubt that the HRC's membership recognizes the gravity of the situation in Iran, and the fact-finding mission established today will help ensure that those engaged in the ongoing violent suppression of Iranian people are identified and their actions documented," he said in a statement.
Also, National Security Advisor to President Joe Biden, Jake Sullivan, described the UN vote as a “clear demonstration of growing international commitment to hold the Iranian regime accountable for its brutal crackdown against the Iranian people.”
