“Dear Mahsa, your name will become a symbol“, proclaims Sunday, under the photo of her grave, the front page of the economic newspaper Asia. The feeling is shared by a large part of the Iranian press, shocked by the death of the young woman arrested by the morality police.
This police unit, responsible for enforcing the Islamic Republic’s strict dress code for women, including the compulsory wearing of the headscarf in public, has been criticized several times in recent months for violent interventions.
Originally from the Kurdistan region (north-west), Mahsa Amini, aged 22, was arrested on Tuesday while she was in Tehran visiting with her family. She died Friday in hospital after three days in a coma.
On Thursday, Tehran police said she was arrested along with other women to receive “instructions“on dress rules.”She suddenly suffered from a heart problem (…) and was immediately taken to hospital“. “Unfortunately, she died and her body was transferred to the forensic institute.“, State television said on Friday.
The young woman was buried on Saturday in her hometown, Saghez, where angry residents threw stones at the governor’s seat and shouted slogans hostile to the authorities. On Sunday, almost all of the press devoted their front page and entire pages to this drama.
“Social Fractures”
“The public is upset and angry about what happened to Mahsa Amini“, notes the reformist newspaper Etemad: the nation has found “repeatedly the violence of the morality police“. And the moderate newspaper Jomhouri Eslami warns against the “social fractures“caused by”violent behavior“police officers.
For its part, the daily Iran, controlled by the government, accuses the reformers “to exploit the emotions of the people by using an unfortunate incident to turn the nation against the government and the president“.
For the ultra-conservative Kayhan newspaper, “the volume of rumors and lies raised after Mahsa’s death has increased dramatically“. “However, the publication of the images of this incident by the police confused the opportunists who wanted to use this incident“, indicates the newspaper.
He is referring to a short surveillance video broadcast by state television showing a woman portrayed as Mahsa collapsing in police premises after a discussion with a female officer.
Tehran police claimed “that there had been no physical contact“between police officers and the young woman. Iranian President Ebrahim Raisi has called for an investigation to be opened.”The nation has expressed grief over Mahsa’s sad death“wrote the ultraconservative Javan newspaper.
1.5 million tweets
Many filmmakers, artists, sports, political and religious figures have expressed their anger on social networks.
Former president and leader of the reformist current Mohammad Khatami called on the authorities to “put an end to actions contrary to law, logic and sharia” and to “bring the perpetrators of the incident to justice“.
Grand Ayatollah Assadollah Bayat Zanjani denounced as “illegitimate” et “illegal” all of the “behaviors and events” at the beginning of “this unfortunate and regrettable incident“. “The Quran clearly prevents the faithful from using force to impose the values they consider religious and moral“, he estimated.
Filmmaker Asghar Farhadi, winner of two Academy Awards for Best Foreign Language Film, observed that “Mahsa is now more alive than us” car “we are asleep, without reaction to this endless cruelty, we are accomplices in this crime“.
“Our daughters’ hair is covered with a shroud“, wrote several players of the national football team in a common story on Instagram.If they are Muslims, may God make me an infidel“, launched Sardar Azmoun, the striker of Bayer Leverkusen.
On Twitter, the hashtag #Mahsa_Amini in Persian was the No. 1 trending Sunday noon with nearly 1.5 million tweets.
During a telephone conversation on Sunday evening with the Amini family, President Raïsi said “assured that he would continue the investigation until the clarification of the case“, according to a press release from the presidency. “Your daughter is like my own daughter and I feel like this incident happened to one of my relatives“, he said according to the same source.