Sattar Beheshti’s Mother: To Vote Is to Become an Accessory to Bloodshed

Sattar Beheshti was a working-class blogger who died in 2012 under torture four days after he was arrested by the Iranian Cyber Police.

His mother Gohar Eshghi issued a public call on Friday for the boycott of the presidential election.

On polling day morning Sattar’s sister posted a picture on Instagram of her mother holding up a handwritten sheet of paper, on which was written: “My compatriots: to vote [in the election] is to vote for ruining Iran more and for the massacre of defenseless people. Do not become an accessory to the unjust shedding of the blood of the young.”

Meanwhile, vast swathes of the Iranian population seem to have greeted election day with utter indifference. Numerous videos posted online showed empty or near-empty polling stations.

Today, besides choosing the next president from the available list of four vetted candidates, people can also vote for local councillors and in the mid-term parliamentary elections.

From the early hours of the morning, Iranian officials and candidates put on a show of rushing to polling stations to cast their votes.

Scores of activists, journalists and ordinary Iranians had declared on social networks that they were not going to vote. The night before the election many received threatening calls, telling them to delete their published statements.

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