Amed – The protests that began in Iran following the killing of Mahsa Amini by the Iranian morality police, have spread all around the world. The members of the Peoples’ Democratic Party (HDP) Women’s Council and Free Women’s Movement (TJA) unfurled a banner reading, “We salute the resistance of women” and featuring an image of Mahsa Amini on the ancient walls of Diyarbakır’s Sur district to support women’s protests in Iran.

Then, they issued a press statement with the participation of many women, including HDP Women’s Council spokesperson Ayşe Acar Başaran, HDP Group Deputy Chair Meral Danış Beştaş, HDP Youth Assembly Spokesperson Dersim Dağ, HDP MPs Feleknas Uca, Remziye Tosun, Dilan Dirayet Taşdemir and Socialist Party of the Oppressed (ESP) Deputy Co-chair Beycan Taşkıran. The women held placards written in Kurdish,Arabic and Turkish reading, “No to killing of women." 

“We salute the resistance women in Iran”

“We gather here to be the voices of the women, who have been taking to the streets to defend life against the male-dominant system, the patriarchal mentality and the mullah regime and to salute their resistance,” HDP Diyarbakır Provincial Co-chair Gülistan Atasoy said in her speech.

“Today, the patriarchal regimes in Turkey, Kurdistan, Iran and all over the world make plans to oppress women, to tell women how they should live, wear and plan their future,” HDP Women’s Council spokesperson Ayşe Acar Başaran said in her speech, adding, “Jina (Mahsa Amini) was a Kurdish woman, who was killed by the Iranian regime for opposing the regime. Women are killed every day in Turkey and Kurdistan by the same monist, sexist, militarist, nationalist regime. Women become the target by provoked men in society.”

“We will keep resisting”

Noting that women continue their activism despite the attacks against them, Ayşe Acar Başaran said, “We salute all people, particularly women, who raise their voices against this system, keep taking to the streets and we express that we stand by their resistance. We, as women, say that we will keep resisting this mentality being imposed on us all over the world, aiming to leave us face to face with slavery. Neither the Iranian regime nor this monist regime in this country will not be able to make women take a step back from their struggle. We will be free.”