Iranian Interior Minister Ahmad Vahidi said that there are at least 52 girls’ schools where cases of possible poisoning of female students have been found. In recent months, about 200 girls and boys from four cities in Iran had experienced health problems after going to school, with symptoms such as nausea, headache, cough, breathing difficulties, palpitations and acute drowsiness; in dozens of cases short stays in hospital were necessary. Now based on the new reconstructions it seems that cases of suspected poisoning have been particularly widespread: they have been found in 21 provinces out of the 30 that make up the country. Some media write that the schools where the cases have been found would be more than 60.
At the moment it is not clear who may have poisoned the students, but already last week the Deputy Minister of Health Younes Panahi confirmed that these were “intentional” gestures. According to some local media, the girls were poisoned by movements of religious extremists, probably inspired by the policies of the Afghan Taliban, which in recent months have banned access to schools for girls and boys.
On Wednesday, after the case of the poisoned schoolgirls had received much attention in the foreign press, the ultra-conservative Iranian President Ebrahim Raisi announced the opening of an investigation. Interior Minister Ahmad Vahidi said over the weekend that “suspicious samples” were collected during the investigations, but he did not give many other details. Quoted by the state news agency IRNA, Vahidi called on the population to calm down, at the same time accusing the media of engaging in “terrorism” and wanting to cause panic over the situation.
