It has become a symbol of the struggle of Iranian women against the mandatory use of the veil. The Iranian student who paraded in her underwear in front of her university in Tehran before being arrested will not be subject to any prosecution, Iranian justice said on Tuesday, November 19.
“As she was taken to the hospital and found herself ill, she was handed over to her family, who is currently caring for her, and no legal proceedings have been initiated against her.”declared the spokesman for the judiciary, Asghar Jahangir, during a press conference.
In videos that have gone viral, we see the student, with long hair falling down her back, walking slowly in front of the prestigious Azad University in Tehran, in panties and a bra, with her bare feet on the asphalt. In other images, men dressed in civilian clothes brutally put her into the car.
Psychiatric disorders often invoked by those in power
Iranian Minister of Science, Research and Technology, Hossein Simaei, denounced the behavior “immoral” of the student, stating that she had not been excluded from her university. In the Islamic Republic of Iran, women must cover themselves completely, leaving only their faces and hands visible, and interaction between men and women is strictly regulated and monitored. Since the establishment of the Islamic Republic in 1979, law in Iran has imposed a strict dress code on women, who must wear headscarves and loose-fitting clothing that hides their shapes.
The Iranian embassy in France assured that the student “suffered certain family problems and fragile psychological conditions”. In the past, the Iranian regime has used forced psychiatric confinement as a means of repression against its opponents, particularly women. This is in particular the case of Roya Zakeri, arrested in October 2023 in Tabriz for not having worn the veil. She was admitted three times to a psychiatric hospital in her city and, in a video published in November 2023, she said: “The Islamic Republic is trying to make me look mentally ill, but I am in good physical and mental health. »
NGO concerns
On November 13, French diplomacy addressed the Iranian authorities. “messages of concern, concern and dismay” after the alleged internment of the Iranian student, nicknamed “the girl of science and research”which bears the name of its university establishment,
For its part, the NGO Amnesty International reported “alarming information” about the transfer of the student to a psychiatric hospital and recalled that “Iranian authorities equate the rejection of the mandatory veil with a “mental disorder” that requires “treatment””.
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This event occurs more than two years after the Iranian women’s revolt, following the death of Mahsa Amini, arrested by the moral police and died in police custody, on September 16, 2022. Mahsa Amini’s death triggered a great protest movement. under the banner “Woman, life, freedom”with demonstrations in several cities in October and November before subsiding.
Several hundred people, including members of the security forces, were killed and thousands arrested. Seven men were executed for their participation in this movement. Challenged by protesters, the moral police had largely disappeared from the streets. And more and more women went out bareheaded, especially in Tehran and big cities.
