Since December 5, the Internet is finally restored everywhere in Iran after a total "blackout" during the protest movement triggered after the November 14 announcement of rising gas prices. With the return of the country online, new details emerge on a particularly bloody episode of repression by the authorities of the Islamic Republic. A real massacre took place in Mahshahr, in the region of Khuzestan (south-west), one of the last to be reconnected to the network. For example, on November 19, dozens of protesters were killed on the sidelines of violent clashes between protesters and guards of the revolution, the regime's security backbone.
A local source told World to have known of the death of at least thirty people, killed in the same place. Reporting the same event, the New York Times reported a death toll of 40 to 100 deaths. Videos filmed during the clashes and published on the Internet since reveal the presence in the region of a heavy device deployed by the guards: pick-up equipped with machine guns and, for the first time since the Iran-Iraq war (1980-1988) , tanks patrolling the city while heavy fire is heard.
"It all started when we blocked the roads leading to the city of Mahshahr from November 15, said at World a protester present on the scene. Our goal was to block the activities of the petrochemical complex of the Imam-Khomeini port. We wanted our voice to be heard by Tehran. The complex hires people from elsewhere, never from here. "
Guardians of the Revolution
It is primarily the regular law enforcement agencies that intervene. The police shoot in the air or with rubber bullets against protesters some of whom carry weapons and start using witnesses to use them. In this region, home to the Arab minority, possession of firearms is common.
The guards of the revolution are then sent on the spot and if the blur persists as for the triggering of the clashes, the fact is that unarmed demonstrators were slaughtered. According to New York Times and the Iranian journalist in exile Shahed Alavi, the Revolutionary Guards were the first to open fire, without warning. But BBC Persian, quoting a resident, said a bullet had been fired from a swampy area of Shahrak-e Shahid Chamran towards the Revolutionary Guards, touching one of them.
