Iran arrests 29 women for removing mandatory headscarf

Rudaw
ERBIL, Kurdistan Region — Iran has arrested 29 women for not wearing a headscarf in public, which has been mandatory in the Islamic Republic since the 1979 Revolution.

Those arrested on Thursday were accused of offending public order and referred to the prosecutor's office in Tehran, reported several Iranian news agencies.


“The bail is too high," the Center for Human Rights in Iran (CHRI) quoted a source close to one of the arrested protesters, Narges Hosseini, as saying, "and Hosseini's family can’t afford it.


A prominent human rights lawyer told AFP on Tuesday that one of the detained women had her bail set at more than $100,000. 

Iran Attorney General Mohammad Jafar Montazeri, who is also a cleric, has called the women's protests "trivial" and "childish" moves possibly incited by foreigners

Several women protested against the compulsory head covering law in the streets of Tehran and Isfahan on Monday and Tuesday.

They removed their scarves and waved them like flags while standing on platforms, CHRI reported, while posting photos of the protesters.

 

 

The women were mimicking the act of civil disobedience by Vida Movahed on a sidewalk on Revolution Street in Tehran on December 27. 

Azar Mansouri, a member of the reformist Union of Islamic Iranian People party, said attempts to control female clothing have failed.

At least two photos on social media this week showed women in traditional black chador dresses, supporting women's freedom of choice for dress.

"I love my hijab but I'm against compulsory hijab," read one sign.

More than 3,700 people were arrested and 23 died in two weeks of nationwide protests that began on December 28 in response to an austerity budget proposed by President Hassan Rouhani.