Videos circulating online show dozens of protesters taking cover in back alleys as the sound of heavy artillery fire echoes through the streets. In some, people lie on the ground, motionless and bloody, while in others, residents flock to the local hospital to donate blood.
Iran became the scene of protests against the Islamic regime after the September 16 death of 22-year-old Iranian Kurdish Mahsa Amini in Tehran, three days after she was brutally attacked and detained by the “vice police” for violating a strict female dress code because, although she wore a “hijab” (Islamic veil), it allowed part of her hair to be seen. On that day, Amini was hospitalized already in a coma and died three days later.
The protests, which were initially centered in the western Kurdish region of Iran, where the young woman was from, spread across the country and escalated into calls for the overthrow of the Islamic fundamentalist clerics who had been in power in the country since the Islamic Revolution in 1979.
Kurdish rights group Hengaw said security forces fired heavy artillery at protesters in the city of Javanrud, where a funeral was held for two demonstrators killed the previous day, citing witnesses that Iranian forces fired machine guns at them.
Hengo also reported that seven people were killed today, while another group, the Kurdish Human Rights Network, estimated that five had died.
The latter group elaborated that many of the wounded were being treated at home for fear of being detained in hospitals, making it difficult to confirm the balance of casualties. He also reported that several of them had been shot in the head or chest.
Iranian authorities severely restrict news coverage of the protests and periodically cut off internet access, making it difficult to confirm the details of the unrest, which has been going on in the country for more than two months.
The semi-official Fars news agency reported on the protests in Javanrud on Sunday evening, saying security forces had been fired upon with live ammunition and two people were killed and four wounded. To date, there have been no reports of such episodes of violence in the state media.
Funeral ceremonies have often been the scene of renewed protests in recent weeks, as was the case during the 1979 Islamic Revolution that brought the clerics to power. The demonstrations of the past two months represent the biggest challenge to the theocratic regime in more than a decade.
At least 426 people have been killed and more than 17,400 arrested, according to Human Rights Defenders in Iran, a group that monitors an ongoing protest movement that has also killed at least 55 Iranian security forces.
Jalal Mahmudzadeh, an MP representing the Kurdish city of Mahabad, told the daily Etemad that 11 people have been killed during protests in the city since late October, many of them in recent days. The MP referred to the fact that some security forces fired on houses and commercial facilities on Saturday, and called on the authorities to take a more moderate position.
Social unrest in the country also marred the 2022 FIFA World Cup, which saw Iran face England, with Iranian players failing to sing their country’s national anthem and some fans chanting Amini’s name in the 22nd minute of the game.
