People In Southwestern Iran Join Antigovernment Protests
Residents in the southwestern city of Ahvaz, which had been relatively quiet during the past two weeks compared to other Iranian cities, held protest rallies on Friday.
Residents in the southwestern city of Ahvaz, which had been relatively quiet during the past two weeks compared to other Iranian cities, held protest rallies on Friday.
According to videos posted on social media, security forces have used teargas to disperse the gatherings in Ahvaz, the capital city of the oil-rich Khuzestan province.
In the videos, women are seen removing their headscarves and swinging them in the air as a symbol of their protest to the compulsory hijab or dress code rules as well the death of Mahsa Amini, the girl whose was mortally wounded in the hands of the country’s so-called morality police, which hassparked an uprising in the country.
Late in May and into the following months, many cities across the province were scenes of angry protests over price rises and economic deprivation triggered by the deadly collapse of a building in the city of Abadan. The gatherings to mourn victims who died in the collapse soon turned intoanti-government protests, with people chanting slogans popular at other antigovernment protests including “Clerics Must Get Lost”, “Our enemy Is Here, It’s a Lie To Say It’s America”, and “Neither Gaza, Nor Lebanon”.
The protests were followed in several other cities and towns across the country and took the Islamic Republic security apparatus one month to repress them.
