Protests that have rocked Iran for nearly two weeks have continued in many cities, including the capital, Tehran, even as the government expands its crackdown to arrest more than just the protesters. streets but also public figures have expressed solidarity with them.
In Zahedan, a city in the southeast with ethnic Baluch, unrest broke out on Friday when security forces opened fire on crowds, and protesters attacked the police station with stones and set fires. a supermarket, according to videos posted on social media.
There are unconfirmed reports of dozens of people killed and injured. Iranian media called the attack on the police station in Zahedan a “terrorist attack” by armed men that resulted in the death of two people and several injuries.
On Thursday night, crowds marched in the city of Sanandaj, in the northwestern province of Kurdistan, and in Mashhad, a city in the northeast, raising their fists and chanting, “Death to the dictator.” In a separate development, women marched without hoods in the southwestern city of Ahwaz and protesters clashed with authorities in Qum, south of Tehran, and fled from bullets from security forces. in the southeastern city of Kerman, according to a video posted on social media.
Among those who have been arrested over the past two days is a former soccer star, Hossein Mahini; and a performer, Shervin Hajipour, who song about the hardships of life in Iran spread rapidly on the internet.
In an attempt to alleviate the protests, Iran severely restricted and slowed internet access, hindering Iranians’ ability to communicate with each other and with the outside world. Videos posted on social media arrive with a delay of hours at the end of each day, meaning little is known about whether the protests will be as widespread, in number and geographical as the days before the period of instability or not.
In Tehran, some residents said in phone interviews that protests have spread to the edges of the capital in smaller pockets. The city still has a tense atmosphere and security forces are patrolling the streets, but normal life has returned to most neighborhoods, they said. Shops and offices in Tehran remain open and children go to school.
Calls for a strike have increased in recent days but in addition to students and professors at several major universities announcing a boycott of classes and a video showing shops closing in the city. Kurdish Oshnavieh, in the northwest, had no other reports of work disruptions.
But other forms of civil disobedience and public solidarity have emerged, including nightly chants of “death to the dictator” from rooftops, women’s shopping without no hijab and anti-government graffiti written on the wall. On Tuesday, in Austria, the Iranian players national football team wore black sports jackets covering the national symbols on their jerseys before the game against Senegal.
Unrest erupted when news broke on September 16 that a 22 year old woman, Mahsa Amini, dead in ethical police custody after being accused of violating Iran’s mandatory headscarf law. Dissent manifests itself in dozens of cities, attracting large numbers of Iranians calling for the overthrow of the autocratic clerics that rule the country.
Security officers confronted the protesters with mass arrests, bullets and batons. Amnesty International said it had confirmed at least 52 deaths, but the number was likely much higher, with hundreds injured and thousands arrested.
President Ebrahim Raisi, a radical cleric, addressed the unrest on television late Wednesday, accusing protesters of taking advantage of Amini’s death to destabilize Iran..
“We must separate legitimate protests from riots,” he said, adding that “the red line of the Islamic Republic is the lives of its people and their property”.
At least 19 journalists have been detained across the country since the protests began, according to Reporters Without Borders. Faezeh Hashemi, the daughter of former President Ali Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani and one of Iran’s most famous reformist politicians, was arrested at a protest in Tehran this week, according to state media.
Sanam Vakil, deputy director of the Middle East program at Chatham House, a British think tank, says the government’s tactics are clear. “The immediate goal is to get people off the streets and back into their homes, which optically and symbolically shows that the state is reasserting this authority,” she said.
“But without any meaningful concessions or access to protesters, grievances will continue to grow,” she added, noting that future protests will inevitable.
Since his election last year, Mr. Raisi has doubled down on enforcement of the head covering law, unlike his predecessor, Hassan Rouhani, a moderate who has reduced the moral police presence.
In a televised address on Wednesday, Mr Raisi said the government could change the way the law is enforced. That seems to refer to the brutal treatment of the protesters by security forces. But he also said that what cannot be changed are “our values”, suggesting that rules such as the mandatory hijab will not be changed.
Hadi Ghaemi, director of the Center for Human Rights in Iran, an independent New York-based organization, said: “These words are empty. Mr Ghaemi added: “He doesn’t have the track record nor the trust from people” to make such changes.
Experts note feelings of vulnerability and despair, especially among younger people and Iran’s working class struggling in an economy ravated by sanctions and regulation weak, difficult to dismiss easily, experts note. Many protests are motivated by protesters who feel They have nothing to lose after years of watching previous uprisings brought no change.
Smoldering resentment may be especially acute in the Kurdish regions of northwestern Iran, where the government response has been particularly heavy. The consequences of the crisis in Iran have spill over the border into Iraqwhere Tehran has attacked Kurdish opposition groups that it accuses of instigating some of the protests.
The cross-border attacks, in the semi-autonomous Kurdistan Region of Iraq, lasted for seven days and killed at least 13 people, according to Kurdish officials. Kurdish news website Rudaw said the death toll had risen to 18 on Thursday. And more than 50 others were injured, including children, after a strike affected a refugee camp in the town of Koi Sanjaq, Kurdistan Region on Wednesday.
Kurdish opposition groups in Iran, including paramilitary forces, have long been based in the Iraqi Kurdistan Region along the Iraq-Iran border. Tehran calls them separatists and regularly launches cross-border attacks against them. Strikes have increased since the latest protests began.
Iran’s Kurdistan Democratic Party, one of the opposition groups targeted in attacks this week, says it is fighting for “a free and democratic Iran”, not independence.
