Human rights

Iranwire – More than 40 countries have expressed “serious concern” at the recent adoption of the Chastity and Hijab bill by the Iranian parliament, saying the proposed law “considerably aggravates” punishments for women and girls who do not wear a compulsory headscarf. The bill “also seeks to force non-complying women into an unprecedented social and economic siege, by imposing travel …

Iranwire – Iranian authorities have ordered a poet and writer who has actively supported the “Woman, Life, Freedom” protest movement to hand himself over to serve an undisclosed prison term. The Culture and Media Prosecutor’s Office issued the summons on October 2 and gave Hujjat Baddaghi five days to comply. In defiance, Bodaghi posted a line of a poem by …

Iranwire – Zahra Shafiei Dehaghani, an Iranian filmmaker arrested during protests last month marking the one-year anniversary of Mahsa Amini’s death, says she and fellow prisoners have been subject to “brutal” physical abuse by female security personnel.  In an audio message from Qarchak’s women prison, near Tehran, Dehaghani described her arrest in the capital on September 16. “Female officers, donned …

RFL/RE – Acting U.S. special envoy on Iran Abram Paley has expressed shock over the reported assault on an Iranian teenage girl by the so-called morality police that left her in a coma. Armita Garawand, 16, had been severely injured after being attacked on October 1 by police, the rights group Hengaw reported. “We are following news of [Armita’s] condition,” …

Iran Human Rights (IHRNGO) – Armita Geravand (Garavand) is a 16-year-old girl who is in a coma at Tehran Air Force’s Fajr Hospital suffering with brain injury following a “violent encounter with metro officers enforcing mandatory hijab.” Maryam Lotfi, a Shargh newspaper journalist sent to report on her story was also arrested to prevent reports of her condition. The only …

iranintl – Anti-hijab ex-detainee Sepideh Rashno was denied presence at her own trial in Tehran after announcing on social media that she would not wear the hijab at the court. In a brief statement, the judiciary said Rashno’s trial was held Monday morning. The statement published by the judiciary’s news agency, said Rashno was “absent” at the trial, so her …

Iranwire – Security forces have tightened security in and around Tehran’s Fajr Air Force Hospital, where 16-year-old Armita Geravand is in a coma after a reported assault on the subway. According to information obtained by IranWire, Armita was admitted to the hospital on October 1 with a “head trauma.” The incident has led to allegations that the teenager was beaten …

Iranwire – An Iranian teenager took her own life earlier this week after being suspended from school for three days for not wearing a mandatory headscarf and for having her nails polished, IranWire has learned.  Zahra Hatami, an eighth-grade schoolgirl from the city of Shahriyar, near Tehran, threw herself from a building on October 2 because she feared her father’s …

Iranwire – The Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) has called on the Iranian authorities not to detain and harass journalists covering the brutal physical assault against a 16-year-old girl in a Tehran subway station. Sources told IranWire that Armita Geravand fell into a coma after being reportedly assaulted by hijab enforcement officers on October 1. The teenager was transported to …

Iranwire – Younes Azadbar, a labor activist incarcerated in the northern city of Rasht, has described his recent hospitalization following an epileptic episode, saying that both his legs and one hand were tied to his bed with “handcuffs and chains.” “I’m Younes Azadbar, a political prisoner in Rasht’s Lakan prison who previously spent 11 years in the prisons of the …