Special Day
Iran: a month of protest and deadly repression
Security forces disperse Iranian demonstrators in Tehran, during a protest against the regime, on September 19.
PA
Text by: Louise Huet
10 mins
On September 13, 2022, Mahsa Amini, a 22-year-old student, was arrested for a veil deemed "
badly worn
".
The announcement of his death, three days later, provoked the uprising of the Iranian population against its Islamic regime and waves of protest throughout the country.
Since then, the movement has not weakened, led above all by women and followed by all the people, despite the murderous repression.
RFI devotes a special day to Iran, a month after the start of the demonstrations.
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“
Woman, life, freedom
”.
The slogan has become the rallying cry of the Iranian population for a month.
A way of proclaiming loud and clear that repressing women is repressing everyone's life.
Iran has been on fire since Friday, September 16.
That day, the announcement of the death of Mahsa Amini, a young 22-year-old student arrested by the morality police for a scarf deemed "
badly worn
", lit the fuse of a revolt that had already been brewing for years.
This rage against the Iranian theocratic regime has therefore led to the insurrection of Iranian youth and all layers of society, sometimes at the cost of their lives.
In a month of protest, the latest report drawn up on Wednesday, October 12 by the NGO Iran Human Rights counts at least 108 dead, including at least 28 children, according to human rights defenders in the country and abroad.
Despite everything, rallies in universities and street demonstrations are still taking place in several cities of the country, as well as strike movements by workers in sites of the energy industry.
A new day of massive protest is announced for next Monday, October 17.
Proof that the revolt movement is far from being paralyzed.
► Also to listen: Mahsa Amini, symbol of the oppression of women in Iran
The unresolved death of Mahsa Amini, the effect of an electric shock
The disturbing death of Mahsa Amini served as a spark.
The young woman had come to Tehran with her brother to visit the capital from her hometown, Saqqez, in Iranian Kurdistan.
She was arrested on September 13 by the morality police, a brigade which monitors strict compliance with the rules, among other clothing, in particular the wearing of the compulsory hijab, for a scarf revealing locks of hair.
Detained by the police, she was then transported to the hospital, then her death was announced three days later.
Tehran police say they have no connection with her death and a medical report dated October 7 says the young woman died of illness, not beatings.
His family, however, firmly refutes this version.
A photo of her in her hospital bed taken by a reporter clearly shows bruising on her face and neck.
Mahsa Amini is buried the next day in her hometown.
The ardor of the Iranian resistance
Immediately, the population rebels, and the death of Mahsa Amini becomes a catalyst for anger.
As soon as his death was announced, protests broke out in several towns in the west of the country.
Two days later, protesters gather in the streets of Tehran, and the uprising quickly spreads across the country.
Universities are becoming the scene of demonstrations, in Tabriz (north-west of the country), Yazd (center), Isfahan (center), many other cities and in the capital.
Iranians
are pounding the pavement
in more than 40 cities, defying police repression.
“
Death to the Islamic Republic!
», «
Death to Khamenei!
» [in reference to Ali Khamenei, the highest authority in the country, Ed], «
No to the headscarf, no to the turban, yes to freedom and equality!
» hammer the protesters, in violent clashes against the police.
According to the Judicial Authority, 125 "
rioters
" have been charged, including 60 in Tehran.
While new demonstrations take place this Wednesday in the capital, curbed by tear gas fire from the police.
Tear gas fired at lawyers protesting in front of the Iranian Bar Association today, Oct 12 #IranProtests #MahsaAmini #مهسا_امینی pic.twitter.com/cR5VNZEXex
— IranHumanRights.org (@ICHRI) October 12, 2022
At the center of the disputes, women, who are demanding the end of a regime that is liberticidal and deeply discriminatory against them.
Despite internet and social media censorship, images from the country show women tearing off their veils, uncovering their hair, burning their hijabs or defying the police.
Also men, protesting against a regime that oppresses them all.
“
The current situation is not confined to women.
On the contrary, it is the question of the whole of society, and that is what is in the process of coming to light ,”
Chahla Chafiq, an Iranian writer and sociologist, exiled in France
, told RFI on September 22
.
High school girls in #Iran, 17 days after the assassination of #MahsaAmini: pic.twitter.com/b48iguRoq8
— Farid Vahid (@FaridVahiid) October 3, 2022
Protest movements, Iran has known many others.
But the duration and scale of the uprising of the past month, as well as the massive participation of youth and women, remain impressive.
For young people, "
It's the Mahsa Amini too much
, assured on October 6 Mariam Pirzadeh, Franco-Iranian journalist and editor-in-chief at France 24.
And for this generation, demonstrating, challenging power is stronger than anything.
The youth are ready to face death and arrest rather than continuing to live with the regime.
»
► Also to listen:
Demonstrations in Iran: a simple revolt or a real change?
A deadly police response
The Iranian police indeed warned the demonstrators on September 28.
“
Members of law enforcement will oppose with all their might the conspiracies of counter-revolutionaries and act firmly against those who disturb public order and security
,”
the Iranian police leadership warned
.
An analysis by
Amnesty International
dated September 30 reveals the maneuvers of the Iranian authorities to systematically crush the revolts.
The NGO describes the deployment of the
Pasdaran
(Revolutionary Guards), the paramilitary force of the
bassidjis
, as well as the riot police and members of the security forces in civilian clothes.
Videos largely bear witness to this violence.
Other young girls who died have become the martyrs of this murderous repression.
Sarina Esmaeilzadeh, a 16-year-old high school student who, according to Amnesty International, is among those killed by Iranian security forces between September 19 and 25.
Nika Shakarami, also 16, disappeared on September 20 while demonstrating in Tehran and then found dead and buried on her seventeenth birthday, October 1.
For the two high school girls, the circumstances of their death remain unclear.
The Iranian justice denies the information of Amnesty International and affirms that it is, in the two cases, of suicides without any link with police beatings.
Rest in peace, daughter of #Iran.
We won't forget you.
#NikaShakarmi pic.twitter.com/vVDGL4ZDTd
— Farid Vahid (@FaridVahiid) October 6, 2022
On September 25, the Iranian media announced the arrest of nearly 1,200 demonstrators, including 60 women, in the north of the country.
In Zahedan, capital of the province of Sistan and Balochistan and in Sanandaj, capital of the province of Iranian Kurdistan, the crackdown has become particularly brutal.
At least five protesters were killed last weekend and 400 were injured in Sanandaj.
“
The crowd took almost every street in Sanandaj.
The forces of repression then opened fire directly on the people using heavy machine guns
,”
Awyar Shekhi, of the Kurdish NGO Hengaw
, told Oriane Verdier, a journalist with RFI's international service.
A battle for information on the internet
The repression perpetrated by the Islamic regime is bloody and physical, but it is also virtual.
The authorities censor internet connections,
monitor the media
and restrict access to social networks, the main weapon and channel of information for Iranians to expose what they live, and what they denounce.
Such restrictions moreover prevent and hamper the investigative work of the associations on the reality of the repression.
On the morning of October 12, the NetBlocks site, which observes internet blockages around the world, noted “
a major disruption of internet traffic in Iran
”.
The incident "
will likely further limit the free flow of information
," he said on Twitter.
⚠️ Confirmed: Metrics show a major disruption to internet traffic in #Iran from ~6 am UTC;
the incident is likely to further limit the free flow of information amid protests over the death of #MahsaAmini 📉
📰 Background: https://t.co/8cCHIJAADQ pic.twitter.com/ZBa62wEILo
— NetBlocks (@netblocks) October 12, 2022
► To read also: Too far, too close: the Iranians face the difficulties of mobilizing and communicating
An information war is being played out between the people and the power in place.
Saturday, October 8, during the 9 p.m. news, the
IRINN television channel was hacked
live for about ten seconds.
On the screen, the face of the Iranian Supreme Leader is represented in flames, in a rifle sight.
On the bottom of the image are photos of four women killed in recent weeks, with a call for Iranians to take to the streets to overthrow Islamic power.
Iranian diaspora support
Defeat this oppressive system, also from abroad.
The Iranian diaspora is mobilizing widely, participating in solidarity demonstrations held in more than 150 cities around the world.
► Also to listen: "Woman, life, freedom", three words and always protesters in Paris to support Iranian women
Celebrities, football players, exiles, all from the diaspora have given their support to the struggle of their colleagues.
“
I don't sleep, I don't eat, I don't take my eyes off the screens or my phone.
What is happening in Iran is so historic!
I try to be a bridge between the East and the West, to decipher Iranian videos and psychology so that no one is indifferent to what is happening there
,” said Iranian actress Golshifteh Farahani in a
maintenance in
the world
.
“
The Iranian women who are rising up today without any weapons carry my voice.
It is the fight of several generations of women that explodes, the fight for freedom, the most beautiful of fights
”, defends, meanwhile, the Iranian painter Nazanin Pouyandeh in a
tribune of
Le Monde
.
► To read also: What political support for the Iranian protest movement?
The reactions of international leaders
The diaspora is not alone.
Many artists around the world, such as French actresses Marion Cotillard or Juliette Binoche, have expressed their support in videos where they can be seen cutting a lock of hair, in tribute to Iranian women.
French actresses including Juliette Binoche and Isabelle Huppert cut locks of their hair off in protest over the death of Mahsa Amini, who died while in the custody of Iran's morality police https://t.co/zf6916dsjw pic.twitter.com/10VBh7F1qY
— Reuters (@Reuters) October 5, 2022
The international community is also outraged by the oppression of Iranians.
Sunday, September 25, the European Union deemed “
unjustifiable and unacceptable
” the “
widespread and disproportionate use of force
” against protesters in Iran.
Western sanctions against Iranian officials are also gradually beginning to take shape.
France announced on October 5 that it was working with the European Union to prepare “
restrictive measures
” against high-ranking members of the Islamic regime, such as the freezing of their assets and their rights to travel.
The following day, the United States also claimed to add economic sanctions against seven senior government officials.
But the Iranian community expects more from Western leaders, so as not to remain alone in the face of the brutality of the Revolutionary Guards, the regime's ideological army.
For the sociologist Chahla Chafiq, the uprising of the Iranian people would remain in vain if it came up against “
the indifference of the West
” and the non-reaction of international institutions.
For now, demonstrations of support are planned in more than 70 cities around the world this Saturday.
In Berlin, a rally for the freedom of Iran on October 22 is expected to be one of the largest demonstrations of solidarity in Europe, and must bring together a very large number of Iranians from the diaspora .
A large freedom for Iran protest will be taking place in Berlin on Saturday, October 22.
Hamed Esmaeilion helped organize the October 1 freedom for Iran protests that took place in more than 150 cities around the world.
Berlin's protest will very likely be huge.
https://t.co/QarIE1DY2J
— Adrienne Mahsa Varkiani (@AdrienneMahsa) October 12, 2022
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