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CNN
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The video was instantly viral: Cell phone footage from anti-government protests in Iran’s Kurdish city of Sanandaj showed a bare-chested man wielding a knife, encircled by about a dozen regime forces armed with guns.
Security officers appeared to take turns cautiously swinging their batons at the protester, some even firing their guns at him, as they sprang back and forth with every lunge he made.
Eventually the protester fell to his knees, after being shot multiple times at close range, he says.
It was the world’s first glimpse of Ashkan Morovati, a Kurdish Iranian boxer who has since become a hero to supporters of Iran’s protest movement.
In an exclusive interview with CNN, Morovati explained the backstory to the video, taken in late October. In the moments leading up to the confrontation seen on camera, he said, he had approached security…
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