"When you watch this video, I will be dead": an Iranian committed suicide on Monday, December 26, by throwing himself into the Rhône in Lyon in order, he says in a posthumous video, to draw attention to the situation of his country shaken by demonstrations against power.

This Iranian was found drowned late Monday afternoon, police told AFP on Tuesday, confirming information from the local newspaper Le Progrès.

The man, 38 years old according to his video, could not be resuscitated despite the intervention of the firefighters, who brought him back to the bank, we learned from the same source.

>> To see: Protest in Iran: "There are all the ingredients for a revolution"

According to several members of the Iranian community, Mohammad Moradi was a history undergraduate and worked in a restaurant.

He lived in Lyon with his wife for three years.

"The police are attacking people, we have lost a lot of sons and daughters, we have to do something", says the man in a calm voice in this video published on several social networks, before committing the irreparable.

"I decided to commit suicide in the Rhone river, it is a challenge to show that we, Iranian people, we are very tired of this situation" he announces.

"When you watch this video, I will be dead," he continues, before calling for support for the Iranian people in their fight against "extremely violent police and government".

"Our voice is not carried by the Western media"

Iran has been experiencing for more than two months a wave of protest unprecedented since the Islamic Revolution of 1979. It was born out of demands for women's rights after the death of Mahsa Amini, arrested for having worn the Islamic veil incorrectly, which are transformed into protest against power.

In a report published on Tuesday, Iran Human Rights (IHR), an NGO based in Oslo, reported 476 protesters killed since mid-September.

The Lyon public prosecutor's office announced to AFP on Tuesday that it had "conducted an investigation into the causes of death, in order to verify the hypothesis of a suicide, in view in particular of the messages published by the person concerned on social networks. announcing his intention".

"The investigation will also seek to determine the motive of the facts," he added.

>> To read: Death of Mahsa Amini: look back at three months of demonstrations and repression in Iran

"Mohammad Moradi killed himself to make the voice of the revolution heard in Iran, our voice is not propagated by the Western media", lambasted Timothée Amini, spokesman for some 3,000 members of the community on Tuesday. Iranian from Lyon during a rally at the scene of the tragedy, Gallieni bridge (between the 7th and 2nd arrondissements).

In front of many journalists, about forty people placed candles, bouquets of roses and photos of the deceased on the railings, before delivering speeches and songs.

"We are entitled to Ukraine every morning, but we hear very little about Iran. It is difficult to live for us, Iranians in the diaspora", insisted Timothée Amini, a political refugee working in computing.

"His heart beat for Iran, he no longer supported this regime," he laments.

With AFP

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