Iranians in several European cities including London and Brussels in the UK and Belgium respectively, held protest rallies on Sunday in support for the 33-year-old Iranian rapper sentenced to death.
Vanguard recalls that Toomaj
Salehi was handed a death sentence for publicly backing nationwide protests
triggered after the death of 22-year-old Mahsa Amini.
In October 2022, Amini was
arrested by Iran’s morality police forsequently died in custody, sparking
protests across Iran.
Iranian authorities arrested
Salehi for supporting the protests and last Wednesday was sentenced to death on
the charge of corruption on Earth.
me of the musicians described
the situation as “a state of shock and disbelief,” emphasising the unprecedented
sentence given to Salehi for peacefully expressing his views.
They named him as a “voice of
the voiceless” and a symbol of the aspirations of a generation yearning for a “normal
life” in their homeland.
Also, demonstrations took place
in Toronto in Canada and some campuses in the United States to condemn Salehi’s
death sentence.
Reports also confirmed that
people gathered in front of Tehran’s consular buildings and in some cities the
main town squares were the venue of demonstrations.
Dozens of political prisoners
in Iran’s Ghezel Hesar prison issued a statement condemning the death sentence,
calling it “the culmination of gross human rights violations in Iran”.
Salehi has also won the support
of major US rappers, as well as human rights groups.
The Iranian press has been
closely following the campus unrest in the US and France, including reports
that 900 American students have been detained in April.
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