Despite a major economic crisis, despite the thousands of Covid deaths (144,000 officials, no doubt more numerous), despite high-tension negotiations on the nuclear issue, the Iranian government continues to have as a major concern the clothing of women. The young Mahsa Amini, 22, is the latest symbol of a repressive policy which, since the beginning of the Islamic revolution in 1979, has taken women as enemies. Originally from Kurdistan, in the northwest of the country, she was arrested last Tuesday in the capital Tehran for an improperly worn veil. Mahsa Amini died in hospital on Friday after a heart attack. The circumstances of his death remain obscure, and suspicions of an act of torture weigh on the police.
The coming to power of ultra-conservative President Ebrahim Raïssi in August 2021 marked the intensification of patrols by the morality police. These officers ensure that women do not walk around with an unknown man (i.e. who is not her brother or her husband), that the veil is properly worn, properly covering the hair from its roots to the shoulders, that the fingernails are not painted, that the “manto”, which Iranian women wear over their clothes, is of the regulation length, etc. While since 2018, Iranian women have been demonstrating more and more openly against these restrictive dress laws, the government took the opposite course last July, by tightening the conditions for wearing the veil. This must now largely cover the neck and shoulders and no longer just the hair.
“We no longer want the compulsory hijab”: on social networks, as in the street, messages are multiplying to refuse these restrictions. Could Mahsa Amini’s death be the last straw in an already overfull vase? “Let all the women in the world say her name” calls out the Iranian activist in exile Masih Alinejad.
Dozens of video images of women cutting their hair and burning their veils are shared on social networks. It is difficult to measure here the courage it takes for them to show themselves with their faces uncovered. At the Amir Kabir University in Tehran, students, men and women together, also demonstrated, photos of the victim in their hands. In the Kurdistan region, several organizations had called for a general strike on Monday.
State media, such as the government agency IRNA, relay the official version of the authorities, namely that there was “no physical contact” between the young woman who died of a heart attack and the police. Some newspapers, however, did not hesitate to put in a photo of the young woman and to evoke the suspicious circumstances of her death. President Ebrahim Raisi has called for an investigation. But little chance that it really succeeds. It should be remembered that the defense of women’s rights is theoretically devolved to Ensieh Khazali, vice-president of the Islamic republic, director of women’s affairs, a largely honorary position. Appointed by President Ebrahim Raïssi in September 2021, she is known for her ultra-conservative positions, in particular on the marriage of minors, in complete coherence with the government in place. Still, Iranian women have always approached prohibitions in their own way, favoring a veil placed over the back of the hair over the large black chador worn by the most religious of them. The death of this new victim of the restrictive policy should only accentuate this movement.
