Amnesty International raises the alarm:
525 people have been killed in Iran since protests erupted on 13 September
following the arrest, and subsequent death, of Mahsa (Zhina) Amini, a 22-year-old girl of Kurdish origins .
Among the victims of the protests there are also 71 children.
Masha Amini had been stopped by the morality police, accused of not wearing the obligatory veil correctly.
Since then, women and men have taken to the streets to demonstrate with the cry of 'Woman, Life, Freedom', and declare their open opposition to the regime of Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, who punishes any act deemed "offensive" to public decency with imprisonment from ten days to two months or with 74 lashes.
The protests continue despite the brutal crackdown which also led to the arrest of 19,000 people, according to Amnesty International
.
The organization denounces serious human rights violations, such as the show trials that led to the death of the protester Mohsen Shekari, convicted of "enmity against God", and another young man, Majidreza Rahanvard, who was hanged a few days later.
Amnesty's fear is that others risk execution, given the thousands of indictments filed so far.
"Precisely this - explains Riccardo Noury, spokesman for Amnesty International Italy -
it is the moment in which international solidarity is crucial.
It is essential that we all unite around the struggle of thousands of women and men who are risking their lives to build a future of rights and freedoms"
.
With these words Noury launches the campaign "Who will fight in your place when you're gone?"
, inviting the supporters of the NGO to encourage the legacy of solidarity, a tool that is fundamental since, they explain, "the Organization does not accept funds from governments, institutions or large companies, but lives on donations from ordinary people".
