“Woman, life, freedom”, “Death to the dictator”, shouted dozens of men and women gathered in the Aichi cemetery of Saghez, the city of origin of Mahsa Amini in the province of Kurdistan, in the west of Iran, according to videos posted on social networks.
The 22-year-old Iranian Kurd died on September 16, three days after she was arrested in Tehran, where she was visiting with her younger brother, by morality police who accused her of breaking the Islamic Republic’s strict dress code. , imposing in particular the wearing of the veil for women.
His death sparked a protest movement unprecedented for three years, which continues across Iran. Young women and schoolgirls are often on the front line, many bareheaded, burning their veils and facing security forces.
Wednesday, the 40th day following the death of Mahsa Amini, marks the end of the traditional mourning period in Iran.
According to human rights activists, the security forces warned the parents of the young woman against organizing any commemoration ceremony, in particular at her grave, going so far as to threaten “the life of their son”.
Images posted online by the NGO Hengaw showed a massive presence on Tuesday evening of security forces in Saghez, whose entrances would have been blocked.
Despite this, dozens of residents entered the town on Wednesday, walking through fields and along roads, in cars and on motorbikes, according to footage uploaded by Hengaw, a Kurdish rights group in Iran, based in Norway.
– “Cemetery of the fascists” –
“Kurdistan, Kurdistan, the cemetery of the fascists,” chanted one of the groups, in another video shared on Twitter by activists. AFP could not immediately verify the authenticity of these images.
In several cities of Kurdistan, “Sanandaj, Saghez, Divandarreh, Marivan and Kamyaran, strikes are widely followed,” Hengaw announced on Twitter.
According to this group, two figures of Iranian football, legendary striker Ali Daei and goalkeeper Hamed Lak, went to Saghez, “wishing to be present on the 40th day of mourning”.
The two men stayed at the Kurd Hotel, according to Hengaw, but “were transferred to the government guesthouse… under the guard of the security forces”.
Ali Daei had previously been questioned for statements made online in support of the movement, and had his passport briefly confiscated.
Unverified footage posted online by the Oslo-based NGO Iran Human Rights (IHR) showed people gathering outside the Kurd Hotel “during an overnight protest”.
The Hammihan daily then quoted the governor of Kurdistan Esmail Zarei Koosha assuring that Ali Daei and other celebrities were in Tehran and that “everything was calm in Saghez”.
The security forces’ crackdown on protests that followed the death of Mahsa Amini across Iran has left at least 141 people dead, including children, according to a new toll revealed on Tuesday by the IHR.
In addition, the city of Zahedan, in the province of Sistan-Baluchistan (south-east), one of the poorest in Iran, was affected by several days of violence sparked on September 30 during demonstrations against the rape of a young girl charged to a policeman, who caused at least 93 deaths according to the same NGO.
23 children were killed in the repression, according to Amnesty International, 29 according to the IHR.
