the Iranian authorities are employing crude tactics to discredit activists campaigning against forced veiling, dissuade others from joining the movement and instill fear in society<\/div>\n
Philip Luther, Middle East and North Africa Research Director<\/footer>\n<\/blockquote>\nIntelligence and security officials orchestrating the production of the propaganda videos are ordering the women\u2019s rights defenders to retract their opposition to forced veiling, denounce the White Wednesdays campaign against compulsory veiling laws and express \u201cregret\u201d for allowing themselves to be \u201cincited\u201d by \u201canti-revolutionary opposition agents\u201d outside the country.<\/p>\n
The most recent case documented is that of women\u2019s rights defender Saba Kordafshari, aged 22, who was arrested on 1 June. According to her mother, Raheleh Ahmadi, following her arrest, Saba Kordafshari was held in prolonged solitary confinement for 11 days in Vozara detention centre in Tehran until 11 June when she was transferred to Shahr-e Ray prison. During her time in solitary confinement she was put under constant pressure to appear before a camera and denounce the White Wednesdays campaign. The interrogators conditioned her release on giving forced \u201cconfessions\u201d and threatened to arrest her mother if she did not \u201cco-operate\u201d. On 10 July, the authorities carried out their threat and arrested Raheleh Ahmadi.<\/p>\n
On 2 July, the authorities transferred Saba Kordafshari to another location and concealed her fate and whereabouts from her family until they returned her to Shahr-e Rey prison on 13 July, so subjecting her to enforced disappearance for 12 days. She subsequently informed her family that she had been held in section 2-A of Evin prison, which is under the control of the Revolutionary Guards, and put under renewed pressure to give forced \u201cconfessions\u201d.<\/p>\n
In another case, women\u2019s rights defender Yasaman Aryani, aged 24, was arrested by security forces on 10 April at her home in Tehran. Her mother, Monireh Arabshahi, was arrested the next day after enquiring about her daughter\u2019s whereabouts at the Vozara detention centre in Tehran.<\/p>\n
Amnesty International has since learned that, while held in solitary confinement for nine days, members of the security forces threatened Yasaman Aryani with, among other things, the arrest of her younger sibling and father unless she appeared before a camera expressing \u201crepentance\u201d for sending videos to the White Wednesdays campaign. She was also taunted with claims that her case had been forgotten by the outside world.<\/p>\n
On 18 April, Yasaman Aryani and Monireh Arabshahi were removed from the Vozara detention centre, put into a van and driven to an unidentified location in Tehran, without being given an explanation. As soon as they were taken out of the van, they were confronted with camera crews from the Islamic Republic of Iran Broadcasting (IRIB) corporation, who filmed them without their consent. They were then taken to a room to be \u201cinterviewed\u201d by the IRIB and, when they objected, were told that they had no choice but to answer the questions.<\/p>\n
In March 2019, the authorities also summoned Zarrin Badpa, the elderly mother of Masih Alinejad, a US-based Iranian journalist and founder of the White Wednesdays campaign, for interrogation. She was questioned for two hours about her daughter\u2019s activities while being filmed. Amnesty International is concerned that the authorities may feature statements she gave under duress in future propaganda videos, given their long-standing record of engaging in such abusive practices.<\/p>\n
\nBy resorting to crude propaganda tactics, the authorities cannot mask the truth that women in Iran are increasingly standing up for their right to choose whether or not to wear a headscarf in public<\/div>\n
Philip Luther<\/footer>\n<\/blockquote>\n\u201cThe Iranian authorities should be under no illusion that the coercive and cruel nature of the video \u2018confessions\u2019 extracted from women\u2019s rights defenders and their families will go unnoticed. Any state-controlled bodies involved in the production and broadcasting of these \u2018confession\u2019 videos share responsibility for the human rights violations committed against the women and their families,\u201d said Philip Luther.<\/p>\n
\u201cBy resorting to crude propaganda tactics, the authorities cannot mask the truth that women in Iran are increasingly standing up for their right to choose whether or not to wear a headscarf in public. They must stop treating women\u2019s rights defenders like criminals and abolish forced veiling laws.\u201d<\/p>\n
Background<\/strong><\/p>\nThe White Wednesdays campaign is a popular online platform on which women from inside Iran share videos of themselves walking in public without a headscarf and expressing opposition to forced veiling and discussing their hopes for women\u2019s rights.<\/p>\n
Amnesty International is aware of at least eight women currently in detention for their activism against forced veiling and the White Wednesdays campaign: Yasaman Aryani and her mother, Monireh Arabshahi; Saba Kordafshari and her mother, Raheleh Ahmadi; Mojgan Keshavarz; Fereshteh Didani; and two other women whose names are not yet known to Amnesty International. They are facing charges including \u201cinciting and facilitating corruption\u00a0and\u00a0prostitution\u201d, \u201cspreading propaganda against the system\u201d and \u201cgathering and colluding to commit crimes against national security\u201d.<\/p>\n
Under Iran\u2019s compulsory veiling laws, the punishment for women seen in public without a headscarf includes arrest, a prison sentence, flogging or a fine. Forced veiling laws violate a whole host of rights, including the rights to equality, privacy and freedom of expression and belief. The practice of compulsory veiling also degrades women and girls, stripping them of their dignity and self-worth.<\/p>\n