What Happens After The Protests In Iran?
Consider This from NPR
NPR
4.2 • 6.2K Ratings
🗓️ 17 February 2023
⏱️ 14 minutes
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Summary
Mary Louise Kelly and a team of producers traveled there last week to see what life looks like, and what remains of the protests that shook the country for months, sparked by the death of 22-year-old Mahsa Amini.
Amini died in police custody after being detained, reportedly for improperly wearing a headscarf, part of Iran's strict dress code for women. Human rights groups say the regime cracked down on those protests with killings, arrests and executions.
In Iran, NPR found people frightened of the regime, but who felt nevertheless compelled to air their grievances.
We speak with Ali Vaez, an Iran expert with the International Crisis Group, about the lingering discontent behind the protests and what could happen next.
Find more of NPR's reporting from Iran.
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Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | Last week I talked to two women on a sidewalk in Tehran, a mother and a |
| 0:05.3 | daughter aged 63 and 41. I flagged them down because they were doing something |
| 0:09.6 | simple but radical. They were strolling with their hair uncovered, defying the |
| 0:14.5 | mandatory dress code for women in public in Iran. |
| 0:17.3 | You're not wearing hijab. Is that new? Did you wear one before the protest? |
| 0:22.6 | Yes, before. I use it, but right now no. When did you take it off? Do you remember? |
| 0:27.4 | Maybe three or four months ago. After death of Masa Amini. |
| 0:32.1 | Masa Amini, of course, is the 22-year-old Kurdish Iranian woman who died in |
| 0:37.1 | police custody in September. She was arrested reportedly for not wearing her |
| 0:41.9 | headscarf correctly. Her death sparked months of protests in Iran. Demands her |
| 0:46.5 | personal freedoms, economic opportunity, even for an end to the country's |
| 0:51.2 | theocratic regime. The government cracked down on the protests hard. Hundreds |
| 0:56.9 | killed by security forces, rights groups say. Thousands of protesters jailed |
| 1:01.4 | that's according to the UN. But here, outside of mall on a drizzly Tuesday, a 63-year-old |
| 1:07.5 | woman is still sending a message. |
| 1:10.2 | The only thing that I can actually do at this age and what I can do now is to not |
| 1:21.1 | have the scarf. To have the scarf or to not have the scarf for me is not very |
| 1:25.3 | important. I'm not young to show off my hair, but I'm not wearing it to show that |
| 1:31.5 | my views are against the government's views. What is the reaction been from your |
| 1:37.0 | friends, from the rest of your family? I have a respect for a hijab because my sister |
| 1:48.5 | wears the hijab, my mother wears it, my friends at the beginning, they were |
| 1:53.5 | worried and they would tell me to wear the hijab. But I told them that if you |
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