They live in Germany and France, and have not seen their families in Iran for years. If they returned home, the regime would imprison, torture or kill them. Now, for the first time, the Iranian diaspora has hope: protests against the Islamic Republic are growing, revolution is in the air. And women like Anahita and Sadaf are doing all they can to support from the outside.

Anahita is a filmmaker from Tehran living in Berlin. The 31-year-old is part of a feminist collective that organized the demonstration with more than 80,000 participants at the Brandenburg Gate. She has given up her job; meets day and night with like-minded people and organizes events where she shouts as loud as she can with slogans like “Woman! Life! Freedom!” she shouts out her anger at the regime.

Sadaf Khadem is the first Iranian female boxer. In 2019, she won an international competition in France – without a headscarf. She was already on her way to the airport when she was warned that she would be arrested in Iran. Since then, the 27-year-old has been living in the French coastal town of Royan, near Bordeaux.