Middle East

‘We need happiness’: Iran’s teenage girls on the front line of protests

Young women become martyrs for the opposition but authorities say suspicious deaths are unrelated to demonstrations

Demonstrators hold placards with the faces of Iranian women Nika Shahkarami and Masha Amini during a rally in support of Iranian protests in Paris this week. Photograph: Julien De Rosa/Getty Images

Najmeh Bozorgmehr in Tehran
Wed Oct 12 2022 - 09:35

Nika Shakarami, an Iranian teenage girl who lost her life during anti-regime protests, holds a microphone and sings a pop song to amuse her giggling friends. “Part of my heart says ‘go’; part of my heart says ‘don’t go’. My heart cannot endure [life] without you.”

Videos and pictures of Shakarami (16), have been widely shared on social media since her death in mysterious circumstances last month.

Shakarami was one of half a dozen teenage girls and young women who had died as protests have swept Iran since mid-September after the death in custody of 22-year-old Mahsa Amini. Amini had been arrested for not fully observing the Islamic dress code.

Young people, including many teenagers and schoolgirls, have dominated the protests, the biggest and longest lasting in Iran for several years. While more men have died in the crackdown, the dead girls have become martyrs, symbols of the struggle for equal rights.

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“My heart is being ripped out of my chest whenever I see videos of innocent girls like Nika,” said a female protester who was joined by her 16-year-old son. They did not want their names to be published. “This can happen to any of us, my son, any teenager in the protests.”

At least 41 people have died since the protests began, according to state television. Authorities and hardline media say that the deaths of Shakarami and other women are unrelated to the protests. They claim their deaths have been exploited by enemies of the theocracy.

The protesters’ decision to publicise these deaths was “a strategy of the enemy”, said Iran’s police chief Hossein Ashtari this month, in a clear reference to the US, Israel and the overseas opposition. He said his force did not use bullets to curb protests, but bird shot. Some of the victims had not even attended protests, he added.

In the case of Shakarami, Judge Mohammad Shahriari, head of Tehran’s criminal prosecutor’s office, said they first received a report of a dead body on September 21st.

“She [Shakarami] was thrown into this building’s yard from the nearby building,” he said this month, according to the state news agency IRNA. “The autopsy showed fractures in her ... head, upper and lower bodies, hands and legs which proved she had fallen from a height,” he added. “Medical exams showed no traces of bullets and bird shot in her body.”

However, the young woman’s mother said her daughter was killed by security forces. In a video she sent to the Prague-based, US-funded Radio Farda, Nasrin Shakarami said Nika left home on September 19th to take part in demonstrations against the obligatory wearing of the hijab.

She spoke to her daughter at around midnight. Her mobile was cut off as she was running away from security forces. “Her arms and legs and body were totally fine ... Her teeth and the back of her head were hit so severely her skull was damaged. She was killed in this way,” she told Radio Farda. She said she was not responding to calls from security officials because she suspected that “perhaps they want me to say she committed suicide”.

The death of Sarina Esmaeilzadeh, a 16-year-old high-school student, in the city of Karaj, west of Tehran, has also shocked Iranians.

At midnight on September 24th the police received a call about a body, according to Hossein Fazeli Harikandi, head of the judiciary in Alborz province. Esmaeilzadeh had gone to the fifth-floor rooftop of her grandmother’s house and then to a neighbour’s rooftop, he said. “Initial investigations suggest she committed suicide,” he said, adding that she had previously attempted suicide by taking pills.

Her injuries were caused by a fall, he said, citing a report from the Iranian Legal Medicine Organization. He dismissed opposition media claims that Esmaeilzadeh had been killed by security forces as “a sheer lie”.

Esmaeilzadeh’s mother — in a video recorded by the judiciary and published by Tasnim news agency, affiliated to the Revolutionary Guards — also said her daughter had not been beaten. “My daughter was not into these things [protests]. She was studious ... and minded her own business.”

Despite her mother’s statement, protesters see Esmaeilzadeh as a martyr and videos of her articulating her hopes and desires have gone viral on social media.

“What are the needs of a 16-year-old teenager? ... To love and to be loved ... We need happiness, good spirit, good vibes and all these need freedom. This makes our discussion a bit dark now because of some restrictions we face like obligatory hijab and not being able to go to football stadiums,” Esmaeilzadeh said in a video posted on Instagram.

Unlike Esmaeilzadeh’s family, the Amini family do not agree with the state’s version of events. Iranian authorities on Friday released the results of their three-week investigation into Amini’s death, absolving the police of blame. The statement by the Iranian Legal Medicine Organization did not give a cause of death. Her father in an audio recording sent to overseas media said she was beaten.

Mohammad Javad Akhavan, managing editor of Javan daily newspaper, affiliated to the guards, said the opposition’s desire to create martyrs was designed to “provoke the public” and give the protests “fresh fuel”.

“But now that it is clear that the killing of Mahsa Amini [by the police] was a lie and the deaths of Nika Shakarami and Sarina Esmaeilzadeh had nothing to do with protests ... those who spread lies about their deaths ... should be held legally accountable,” he said.

Even in the face of such condemnation, relatives continue to question the official narrative.

Hadis Najafi (22), was one of the first women to die during the protests on September 21st. Her sister told Radio Farda that authorities told them she had taken fright and died of a heart attack. It was not clear what had frightened her. Her father said he did not believe she was killed by police, adding that “my daughter was into music, not into riots, no way”.

In a video posted on social media, her mother said: “My daughter died because of [protesting against] hijab, because of Mahsa Amini ... She was killed in the protests with three bullets, one in the heart, one in her belly and one in her neck. When I put aside the shroud to look at her face, her whole face and body were also full of bird shot.”

The death of Mahsa Mogouei, an 18-year-old woman, in the small town of Fuladshahr on September 22nd has also attracted suspicion. “I know the police did not kill my daughter,” said her father, adding there were no protests there. Asadollah Jafari, the top judiciary chief of Isfahan, said “unknown figures” had fired bird shot at her. “The hostile media linked her [death] to protests which have not been proven so far,” he added. State media broadcast interviews with passers-by who had seen or heard shooting from a car.

In such fraught situations, with authorities and protesters unable to agree on the cause of death, even burials have become contested.

Nika Shakarami’s mother decided to bury her daughter in their home town of Khorramabad, western Iran.

But security forces, she said, “stole” her daughter’s body and buried it in a remote village. Hardline media said this burial site was next to her late father’s grave.

October 3rd would have been Nika Shakarami’s 17th birthday. In a video posted on Twitter, her mother said: “I tell you Nika that your martyrdom is being honoured.”

— Copyright The Financial Times Limited 2022

Iran Protests