Over the past few months, protests have occurred across the globe against the human rights abuses in Iran by the Islamic Regime. The protests were sparked by the deaths of 22-year-old Mahsa Amini and 16-year old Nika Shakarami at the hands of Iranian morality police in September. Those who go against the stringent rules enforced by the police risk arrest or even death. Groups at USC have been holding weekly protests in solidarity with those protesting in Iran. USC biomedical engineering student Niki Tavakoli, whose family is from Iran, joined the protest on USC ‘s campus today, waving the lion and sun flag. This flag was an emblem of Iran for thousands of year, but was replaced by a flag representing the Islamic regime during the Iranian Revolution in 1979.
Niki Tavakoli: “Two months ago, a young woman was killed, murdered in Iran because some hair was showing outside of her hijab, which is mandatory to wear in Iran. There is no freedom to wear what you want. You say what you want. And she was beaten to death with a baton...this was kind of just it really hit the nail on the head and now is it has turned into a worldwide revolution.”
Many Iranians have fled to the United States seeking refuge from the oppressive government. In fact, with 700,000 Persian residents, Southern California hosts the highest population of Persians in the world outside of Iran. Tavakoli says we can continue to support people in Iran by carrying on with protesting and encouraging our government to take action.
Niki Tavakoli: “And that’s really the one thing that we can do here in the United States and Canada and Europe is to keep spreading awareness and let people know that this is a revolution and it’s not going anywhere until this government is overthrown.”
Protesting crowd: “Justice for Mahsa! Justice for Mahsa! Justice for Mahsa! Justice for Mahsa! Justice for Nika! Justice for Nika! No to dictator! No to dictator!”
For Annenberg Media, I’m Grace Galante.