Intended to support future investigations and accountability efforts, the Iranian Archive is dedicated to the forensic preservation of digital artifacts documenting serious human rights violations and international crimes committed by the Islamic Republic of Iran (IRI) during its brutal crackdown against the Woman, Life, Freedom movement. These violations by the IRI extend beyond just protesters, targeting bystanders, family members, and individuals expressing dissent online.
Recognizing the significant risk Iranians were taking to document and share the violence committed against them by the IRI as part of its repressive campaign against the Woman, Life, Freedom movement, Atlantic Council’s Strategic Litigation Project (SLP) and Mnemonic led a coalition of international organizations to launch the Iranian Archive. This landmark archival project has already forensically preserved over two million vulnerable digital artifacts recording human rights violations and international crimes committed in the context of these protests.
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About the project
Many of the events documented appear to be serious human rights violations and, as the United Nations fact-finding mission on the IRI found in its report, amount to crimes against humanity such as murder, rape, persecution, torture, and enforced disappearance, among others. Evidence preserved in the archive relates to numerous violations, including intentionally blinding protesters, enforced disappearances and deaths of children, and targeted abuse based on gender, ethnicity, religion, and sexual orientation. Journalists and other frontline defenders have also been systematically targeted.
Due to security concerns, the Iranian Archive’s organizers are currently only making the records available to vetted national authorities, international investigative mechanisms, and organizations working towards accountability for the violent crackdown against civilians during nationwide protests which began in 2022.
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The coalition behind the Iranian Archive is led by the Strategic Litigation Project and Mnemonic, in partnership with the Promise Institute for Human Rights at UCLA Law, UC Berkeley’s Human Rights Center, Amnesty International’s Digital Verification Corps, the Iran Human Rights Documentation Center and the Azadi Archive. The archive joins other standalone archives created to support international investigations on atrocities in Syria, Yemen, Sudan, and Ukraine.
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