Gunfire, blasts in western Iran amid Mahsa Amini protests

Iranian students at Tehran’s Azad University participate in a protest with their palms covered in red paint to symbolise blood. Pic/AFP

The sound of apparent gunshots and explosions echoed early on Monday through the streets of a western Iranian city at the epicentre of protests over the death of a 22-year-old woman, with at least one man reportedly killed by security forces in a village nearby, activists said.

The incidents come as demonstrations rage on in cities, towns and villages across Iran over the September 16 death of Mahsa Amini, who died days after being detained by the morality police in Tehran.

While Iran's government insists Amini was not mistreated, videos of violent confrontations between women wearing their mandatory headscarf, or hijab, loosely have sparked suspicion she suffered physical abuse during her detention.

From Tehran and elsewhere, online videos have emerged despite authorities disrupting the internet showing women marching through the streets without the hijab, while others confront authorities and light fires in the street as the protests continue into a fourth week.

The violence early on Monday occurred in Sanandaj, the capital of Iran's Kurdistan province, as well as in the village of Salas Babajani near the border with Iraq, according to a Kurdish group called the Hengaw Organisation for Human Rights.

Workers at the site of a major complex of refineries crucial for Iran's massive offshore natural gas field at Asaluyeh on the Persian Gulf protested Monday over the death of Amini, online videos appeared to show.

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