Back on the streets in Tehran — Protests after Ukrainian Flight PS752

Protestor mourns the deceased of Ukrainian Flight PS752 (Cr: LA Times)

By: Rossella Gabriele

New York— Corruption and mismanagement in the Iranian government skyrocketed inflation and sent 1.6 million Iranians into poverty in 2018. In 2019, the people of Iran took to the streets to demand sweeping reform as the world watched. 

Ignited by a spike in oil prices, protests began November 15, 2019, and by their second day, spanned over 50 cities from Tabriz to Chabahar.

Iranians left their cars in the streets, closed up businesses, and marched en masse, chanting "Rouhani, leave this country.” What began as peaceful protests then turned into violent riots as banks, religious schools and monuments to the Islamic Republic were burned. 

The Iranian government’s crackdown employed excessive measures, shooting protestors from rooftops with machine guns, confiscating the bodies to prevent accurate death counts, and threatening families of victims to not go to the media or hold funerals, according to Amnesty International.

Iran’s government quickly shut down internet and social media access to block information sharing on these abuses, and it is confirmed that at least 1,500 people have been killed by the government over the course of the unrest, 4,800 have been injured, and over 7,000 arrested. 

The recent escalation in tensions between the US and Iran has distracted the international community from the Iranian people’s demands for a fair, accountable, and more open government. Successful activism could serve to improve the living conditions of millions of people currently who are in poverty or are prisoners of thought in Iran.

One such prisoner of thought is Yasaman Aryani, a young Iranian actor who engaged in peaceful resistance by handing out flowers to other Iranian women with her hair uncovered in March 2019. 

Iran’s mandatory veiling law has resulted in her receiving a 16-year prison term for advocating for women’s rights. Currently Yasaman is one of the youth advocacy cases highlighted by Amnesty International.

Current protests have evolved to call for accountability for the downed Ukrainian passenger plane that the government admits it shot down “unintentionally” while attempting to defend against US missile attacks.

As the crisis worsens and the international political landscape becomes murkier, Iranian students, protestors and everyday people continue to risk everything to change their nation, rise out of poverty and free the politically imprisoned in Iran. 

You can write a letter to the Iranian government to urge Yasaman Aryani’s immediate release here.