'This time it's different. They have taken to the streets in ultimate unity'
More than a decade after he fled to northern Iraq, Iranian Kurdish activist Sirvan Hassan is captivated by the protests sweeping across Iran over the death of Mahsa Amini in police custody last month.
Hassan – one of some 10,200 Iranian Kurdish refugees or asylum-seekers in Iraq’s northern Kurdistan region – said they were all gripped by the “revolution” that started in Iran’s northwestern region, where most of the country’s estimated 10 million Kurds live.
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"Even if I am at work, I have my phone in my hands… to check the news and see what's happened," said the 40-year-old, who was once a Kurdish peshmerga fighter and escaped Iran after he was briefly arrested about 14 years ago.
"They are waiting to see where the revolution will go, what will happen to the people. Will they be killed, will they succeed, or fail? Honestly, this has taken over our souls."
The unrest in Iran erupted nearly three weeks ago after Amini, a 22-year-old Iranian Kurd, was killed after being detained for wearing clothes deemed “inappropriate” by the Islamic Republic’s morality police.
According to Iranian authorities, however, Amini – whose Kurdish name was Jhina – died because of "surgery for a brain tumor at the age of eight.”
Iran's Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei said earlier this week that her death “deeply broke my heart,” but gave his full backing to security forces confronting the unrest, in which rights groups say more than 150 people have died.
"We have been in previous protests but this time it's different. They have taken to the streets in ultimate unity. I hope, with our constancy, we get results," Hassan said.