She was a Kurdish woman who had been visiting relatives in the Iranian capital Tehran. Mahsa Amini (who was also called Jina) was out and about in the city when she was detained by the morality police for not wearing the hijab according to Iranian law. No one knows what happened in the time she was brought to the centre where the authorities impart “education” about the proper hijab. The next time Amini’s family saw her she was dead.
A photo circulating on the internet showed the 22-year-old woman before the detention, another showed her hooked up to various tubes, blood oozing from her ear. Her body appears lifeless even in the photo. Reportedly, a woman who had also been detained said that Amini complained she had been hit by the police. The state released a short CCTV clip which purportedly shows Amini collapsing.
In the meantime, a wave of protests has erupted in Iran.
The protests that began in Tehran have spread to cities and towns in most Iranian provinces. Led largely by young people they have included a wide variety of social classes and ethnicities.
There are a number of issues that have caused the festering discontent in Iran – not least the horrendous condition…
