Pouya Bakhtiari

Pouya Bakhtiari (Persian: پویا بختیاری‎) was an Iranian protester who was shot and killed on 16 November 2019 in Karaj during the 2019 Iranian protests. His death and his parents' reaction garnered nationwide attention.

Life

Pouya Bakhtiari was born on 10 September 1992 in Tehran, Iran. He received his degree in electrical engineering and operated his family's workshop. Bakhtiari was interested in Iranian history and poetry, and wanted to eventually immigrate to Canada.

Death

Manuchehr Bakhtiari, Pouya's father, who served for five years in the Iran–Iraq War announced that his son had died on 16 November 2019 in Mehrshahr due to a gunshot wound to the skull. According to him, Pouya was accompanied by his mother on the second day of the 2019 Iranian protests in Mehrshahr and was pronounced dead before he reached the hospital. Pouya's mother stated that "For a moment I saw that people were carrying the body of a protester, and I realized it was my son".

In an interview with Masih Alinejad, Manuchehr Bakthiari stated that "They killed my son, they might as well execute me. My son was interested in poetry and literature, not hooliganism. People are tired of the officials [of this country] who steal and are corrupt, and it is for this reason that they call people like my son hooligans while they are the real hooligans".

Pouya Bakhtiari's body was buried on 19 November 2019 in Behesht Sakineh Cemetery in Karaj.

Government arrested his family while they wanted to hold a public memorial service on 26 December 2019.

Video

On the day of his death, Pouya Bakhtiari recorded a series of videos on his phone from protests during the day and continuing in to the night which were widely circulated after his death. In these videos, before his death, Bakhtiari documents the protests of 16 November in Karaj.

After the original release of the video by BBC Persian, the entire video was released by Masih Alinejad, which made apparent that that the BBC had censored part of the original video. In the censored part of the video, Bakhtiari says "Bravo to everyone! People don't lose this opportunity to once and for all destroy this criminal and corrupt regime which has pillaged our beloved Iran for 40 years."