Iran is about to implement a brand new set of stringent morality legal guidelines this week, imposing extreme penalties, together with the demise penalty or as much as 15 years of imprisonment, for violations of its costume code. These measures are a part of an intensified effort to uphold the “tradition of chastity and hijab” and have drawn widespread criticism each domestically and internationally.
What Do the New Legal guidelines Entail?
The legal guidelines goal people who have interaction in actions deemed as “selling nudity, indecency, unveiling, or improper dressing.” These broad phrases criminalize ladies for not adhering to the obligatory hijab guidelines, together with anybody opposing these rules.
Key Provisions of the Legal guidelines Embody:
Demise Penalty Beneath Article 286: Reserved for instances the place actions, reminiscent of sharing movies of unveiled ladies with international media or peaceable activism, are categorized as “corruption on Earth.”
Article 60: Imposes penalties, together with imprisonment or fines, for people who try to intervene or forestall the harassment of ladies defying the obligatory costume code.
Punishments Past People: Companies, academic establishments, taxi drivers, and broadcasters face strict penalties for failing to adjust to or report violations of the morality legal guidelines.
Mahsa Amini’s Demise and Its Aftermath
The legal guidelines come two years after the demise of 22-year-old Mahsa Amini, a Kurdish lady detained for allegedly carrying her hijab incorrectly. Her custodial demise on September 16, 2022, sparked nationwide protests underneath the slogan “Ladies, Life, Freedom.”
Authorities claimed her demise was attributable to cardiac failure, however her household strongly rejected this, alleging custodial brutality. Amini’s demise grew to become a flashpoint for broader anti-government protests addressing inflation, unemployment, sanctions, and repression underneath Ayatollah Khamenei’s regime.
Amnesty Worldwide Condemns New Measures
Human rights teams have condemned the legal guidelines, calling them an assault on ladies’s freedoms and peaceable dissent. Diana Eltahawy, Amnesty Worldwide’s deputy director for the Center East, mentioned:
“This shameful regulation intensifies the persecution of ladies and women for daring to face up for his or her rights following the Girl, Life, Freedom rebellion.” She additional added that the legal guidelines intention to entrench the “suffocating system of repression” in opposition to ladies whereas making their lives “much more insupportable.”
Hijab Rehabilitation Clinics
Along with punitive legal guidelines, Iran has launched “Hijab Rehabilitation Clinics” for girls who resist the costume code. These facilities, together with one named the Clinic for Quitting Hijab Removing, are framed as psychological well being initiatives however are extensively seen as one more try to suppress feminine dissent.
The transfer adopted viral movies of an Iranian pupil stripped on campus for refusing to put on a hijab. Critics argue that these clinics intention to additional management and silence ladies who oppose the obligatory costume code.
