Mahsa Amini fell into a coma after being arrested in the capital Tehran by officers enforcing the country’s strict hijab rules. Police said he was taken to hospital after suffering a heart attack – but family members told local websites he had no history of heart problems. Posts on social media now show protesters chanting “death to the dictator” as drivers honked their car horns in a Tehran square near the hospital where Ms Amini died. Iranian President Ebrahim Raisi, meanwhile, called for the cause of the incident to be investigated with “urgent and special attention”, state media reported. Ms Amini was visiting her family in Tehran when she was arrested on Tuesday for her “allegedly inappropriate hijab”, according to the Center for Human Rights in Iran. “Her family was told she was being taken for ‘re-education’ and would be released later that evening,” the organization said. The hijab – an Islamic headscarf – has been compulsory for women in the Middle Eastern country since the 1979 Islamic Revolution, and the morality police are known for enforcing the rules zealously. Particularly since 2017 – when dozens of women publicly removed their headscarves in a wave of protests – the authorities have adopted tougher measures. But some hope Ms Amini’s death could be a turning point, with condemnation coming from Iranian celebrities, athletes and other public figures. Reformist former president Mohammad Khatami said the behavior of the morality police was a “disaster”, while popular ex-footballer Ali Karimi tweeted that while children of high-ranking officials were fleeing the country, “our children are dying”. As protests continued in the capital on Saturday morning, police insisted there was no violence against Ms Amini while in custody and took the unusual step of releasing CCTV footage apparently showing her in a police station with other detainees. At one point she gets up from a chair, goes to talk to another woman, then holds her head with both hands, trips over a chair and collapses. In another clip, he is seen being carried away on a stretcher.
