The uprising after the death of Mahsa Amini at the hands of the morality police is diffusely affecting the whole country. Triggered by the brutality of the police, it turned into an unprecedented movement that quickly targeted the theocratic regime.
Milan Haqiqi’s grandparents were given one hour to bury his body. The 21-year-old was killed on September 21 during a protest in the northwestern Iranian city of Oshnaviyeh. “The last time I had my son on the phone, he promised to send me the most beautiful pictures from the street. I only received the pictures of his dead body,” says his father, Salim Haqiqi, who lives in Norway. My son wanted freedom and equality. He and the other protesters were chanting, “Woman, life, freedom!” Their protest was peaceful.”
Milan was shot and killed. Next to him, two of his friends, Sadreddin Litani and Amin Mareft, aged 27 and 16, were also killed. According to the Oslo-based Iran Human Rights organization, at least 57 people have been killed in the nationwide protests that began on September 16. The wave of protests that has swept Iran since the disappearance of Mahsa Amini, a 22-year-old woman of Kurdish origin who died three days after being arrested by the vice police in Tehran on September 13, is unprecedented. What is happening should not be reduced to demonstrations,” explains a sociologist who lives in Tehran and prefers to remain anonymous. Iran is experiencing an ongoing, broad and widespread phenomenon, where protesters do not hesitate to respond to the violence of the military forces with violence. We are now witnessing an uprising.
On the night of Sunday 25 to Monday 26 September, rallies and clashes rocked 30 of the country’s 31 provinces as the movement entered its tenth consecutive day. While they seem to be concentrated mainly in the northwest, particularly in the provinces of Tehran, Kurdistan and Mazandaran, the protests are diffusely affecting the entire country.