Sarina Esmailzadeh, a 16-year-old girl from Mehrshahr in Karaj, was killed due to multiple baton blows by security forces in the September 22 protests. Authorities have aired so-called confessions by alleged family members announcing her cause of death as suicide.

After reviewing the evidence and speaking to eyewitnesses and close sources, Iran Human Rights confirms Sarina’s state killing, and strongly condemns the pressure on her family by security agencies to force them into repeating the false suicide narrative. The organisation demands the international legal prosecution and sanctioning of the Islamic Republic of Iran Broadcasting’s (IRIB) directors.

According to information obtained by Iran Human Rights, “after her English class ended at noon on September 22, Sarina Esmailzadeh and several of her friends went to join the people’s protests near her language school. At the protest, security forces repeatedly beat Sarina on the head with a baton until she was severely bleeding from the head.”

As it was impossible to transfer Sarina to a hospital, a source said, people took her to a house nearby to treat her wounds but Sarina had already passed away.

A source added: “Sarina’s family didn’t know what had happened to her until her friends who were with her at the protest, contacted them at 10:30 pm, informing them that Sarina had been killed by the security forces.”

According to the source, when her family went to the location of the protest, people told them that Sarina’s body had been taken to the hospital by an ambulance. But her family’s search for her at hospitals and morgues proved fruitless and none of the relevant authorities would give them a clear answer about where Sarina’s body was.

Sarina Esmailzadeh was born on 2 July 2006 and lived with her mother and older brother. She had lost her father in childhood.