Mousavi supporters in Shiraz remain committed to the cause and are prepared to endure, writes MARY FITZGERALD
IT IS early Saturday evening in Shiraz, the city in southwestern Iran renowned for its poets, roses and nightingales.
Maryam and her three girlfriends are packed into her car, and as they drive through busy streets they note the clusters of riot police and soldiers that have gathered in anticipation of trouble later that night.
For the past week, the denizens of this famously laid-back city have felt tense and anxious. The protests that have rocked Tehran in the wake of the disputed June 12th presidential election have also played out here, albeit on a smaller, yet deadly, scale.
At least two people were killed when police and pro-government militia known as basij clashed with demonstrators last week at Eram Square, close to Shiraz University. Several students were injured when the basij reportedly stormed a university dormitory.
A number of Maryam’s friends were beaten after they took to the streets to protest an election they believe was stolen. Others were arrested, and have not been heard from since.
Maryam and her friends are all in their late 20s and early 30s. Two are graduate students, one works as an engineer, another in electronics. Under their knee-length tunics and coats, they wear jeans with Converse trainers or open-toed sandals. One has painted her toenails a deep black-red.
On Maryam’s dashboard lies a frayed cord in the signature green of Mir Hussein Mousavi’s campaign. In her handbag, she carries a picture of Mousavi and Mohammad Khatami, the reformist president elected in 1997.
Maryam and her friends all voted for Mousavi, the man considered President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad’s main challenger, and the man who now finds himself the unlikely figurehead of a protest movement that refuses to back down on its demands for Ahmadinejad’s re-election victory to be annulled.
“Reform in our country is a process that needs to happen gradually, and Mousavi understands that,” says Maryam. “Radical change is not for Iran.”
This is the reason she did not vote for Mehdi Karroubi, a former parliamentary speaker and another of only four candidates permitted to run for the presidency. She makes fun of Karroubi’s efforts to reach out to young Iranians – at one stage he met with Sasy Mankan, one of the country’s best known underground rappers.
“Karroubi wanted to open the door to everything. It won’t work like that here. Mousavi is someone who can pave the way for us to gain our goals.”
Around her wrist, Maryam has tied a thick black ribbon as a sign of mourning for those who have died in the past week, as allegations of vote rigging in the election prompted what has become the greatest crisis the Islamic Republic has faced since its turbulent birth in 1979.
Mobile phones ring constantly, friends in Shiraz and Tehran updating the four women on the situation where they are. Maryam drives while juggling two phones.
They talk of what has become a nightly ritual in both cities: Mousavi supporters going up on the roof of their homes to cry out Allahu Akbar in solidarity with each other. The same thing happened in 1979 when revolution was in the air.
“I really like Zahra Rahnavard [Mousavi’s wife],” says one of Maryam’s friends, who is also a women’s activist. “I believe in her and I like her way of thinking. Both of them are logical in their decisions and thinking.
“Ahmadinejad has limited women’s role to the family and the home. He has not been good for Iranian women.”
Another friend says her husband, like many disaffected young Iranians, did not vote as a mark of protest. “He thinks I’m crazy because I get anxious if there are problems with the phones or internet and I can’t find out what is happening,” she says.
Maryam worked with an Iranian NGO until it was closed down during Ahmadinejad’s first term, one of the many casualties of his crackdown on civil society groups.
“Ahmadinejad has a very closed mind mentality,” she says. “It is not good for Iran’s development. We are not interested in another revolution, we just want the best for our country.” The car windows are open and as we enter an underpass, we hear shots ring out in the distance. The drivers in front frantically try to turn around in the tiny, backed-up space – everyone wants to get away from the gunfire. We later learn that police fired shots in the air to disperse protesters who had gathered at nearby Eram Square. Driving away, we discover several streets leading to the square have been sealed off, while ambulances struggle to get through the traffic.
One young man shows us livid welts and bruises on his arms where he says police beat him. The phones start ringing again. Scores, including several friends of Maryam, have been arrested.
Across the city, the sun is setting on the tranquil garden and orange grove where Hafez, the celebrated 14th century Persian poet, is buried. In Iran, they say every home must have two things: a copy of the Koran, and the works of Hafez. His grave, strewn with rose petals, inspires devotion and no little emotion.
One young man appears to be silently sobbing as he crouches by the tomb, arms spread across its verse-engraved marble. “Here it is peaceful, but outside feels like jang [war],” whispers Maryam.
Later, as recitations of Hafez’s lyrical poetry float from a loudspeaker, the four friends anxiously discuss the latest from Tehran over tea and faludeh, the dish of frozen vermicelli doused with lemon syrup that is a Shirazi speciality. News comes of possible deaths in Tehran as the authorities stay true to their warning that protests will not be tolerated.
Another call reveals that Mousavi has announced he is prepared for martyrdom.
Another claims he has even started wearing the white shroud used for burial. And there is more news of further violence and arrests in Shiraz itself.
Maryam leans over. “You know last week after the demonstrations in Shiraz, and after we heard those people had been killed, I came here.
“I sat by Hafez’s tomb and I said: ‘Do you see, Hafez, what they are doing to the people of your beloved city? Where will this end’?”