Protesters returned to the streets in a number of large cities across Iran to mark 40 days since the execution of two men who’d been arrested for participating in the recent anti-government unrest.
Videos shared on social media by activist groups and the BBC purportedly showed gatherings in several districts of Tehran, the central city of Esfahan, Mashhad in the northeast, Karaj, Arak in the southeast and the western Kurdish city of Sanandaj.
None of the footage can be verified by Bloomberg.
The crowds can be heard chanting “woman, life, freedom” and other slogans condemning the state and Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei.
Widespread demonstrations against the Islamic Republic’s theocratic system erupted last September after the death in police custody of 22-year-old Mahsa Amini. She’d been arrested for allegedly violating strict Islamic dress codes that are enforced on women.
The protests grew into the largest public rebuke against the state since 1979 but have largely gone quiet since December as authorities started a brutal crackdown and began executing individuals detained for protesting.
Some 20,000 people have been arrested in the unrest and at least 500 have been killed by security forces, according to rights groups who’ve also said many people have been tortured inside prison.
Thursday evening’s gatherings coincided with a traditional mourning ceremony marking 40 days since authorities hanged 23-year-old Mohammad Mehdi Karami and 39-year-old Mohammad Hosseini.
A court had convicted them of “corruption on earth” and “disrupting public order” after they were accused of killing a member of the plainclothes Islamic militia during protests on Nov. 3.
London-based Amnesty International said they were hanged after unfair and fast-tracked sham trials in which the pair were barred from choosing their own lawyers.
