Three members of the sports community killed by direct gunfire in Tehran

Hengaw – Wednesday, January 14, 2026

Three members of Iran’s sports community — Mojtaba Torshiz, a former footballer; Ahmad Khosravani, a young basketball player; and Mehdi Lavasani, a football coach — were killed after being shot by Iranian government forces during protests in Tehran.

According to information received by Hengaw Organization for Human Rights, the three men were killed on the evening of Thursday, January 8, 2026, during protests in the capital. Torshiz, a father of two from Qaem Shahr in Mazandaran Province, Khosravani, a 21-year-old student and resident of Tehran, and Lavasani, a young football coach, were all fatally shot by government forces.

Further details indicate that Lavasani, the father of a two-year-old child, was shot in the back and died at the scene.

Khosravani was a member of the Farzan Shemiran 3×3 basketball team and a student at Sharif University of Technology. He had won championships in Tehran’s 3×3 basketball competitions.

Torshiz had previously played for several Iranian football clubs, including Nassaji Mazandaran, Tractor, Fajr Sepasi, and Mes Kerman.

Hengaw confirms that more than 2,500 people have been killed across Iran during the recent protests. To date, the identities of 90 individuals have been fully verified by Hengaw’s verification team and published across Hengaw’s platforms.