{"id":3616,"date":"2024-05-19T07:24:05","date_gmt":"2024-05-19T06:24:05","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/codir.net\/?p=3616"},"modified":"2024-05-19T07:24:06","modified_gmt":"2024-05-19T06:24:06","slug":"i-am-ready-to-return-whenever-they-say-nasrin-sotoudeh-on-prison-the-hijab-and-violence-in-iran","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/codir.net\/?p=3616","title":{"rendered":"\u2018I am ready to return whenever they say\u2019: Nasrin Sotoudeh on prison, the hijab, and violence in Iran"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Exclusive: the human rights lawyer, temporarily released from jail on medical grounds, describes her love for her family, and why she keeps going despite brutal treatment at the hands of the regime<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Iran\u2019s Qarchak jail has been called many things: a torture chamber; the worst women\u2019s prison in the world; unfit for humans. Nasrin Sotoudeh<\/a> uses just one word to describe the nine months she spent there: \u201cHell.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Sotoudeh does not speak of the appalling conditions<\/a> or stench of sewage, the undrinkable water or lack of food, the disease or cruelty of solitary confinement. She simply says: \u201cI am ready to return whenever they say.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The lawyer and human rights advocate was three years into her sentence of 38 years, alongside 148 lashes<\/a>, when it was paused on medical grounds after she was diagnosed with a heart condition in 2021.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Her temporary release means she is living at home in Tehran with her husband, Reza Khandan, and son, Nima, 16, but it has not freed her from constant government harassment. The authorities have been relentless in their efforts to silence her, bringing three new cases against her; sentencing her to a further eight years in prison; banning her from practising law and using social media; sentencing her husband to five years; freezing her bank assets; and prohibiting her daughter, Mehraveh Khandan, from leaving the country. The restriction on Khandan, 24, who is now studying art in the Netherlands, has been the only liberty infringement Sotoudeh has successfully fought.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cMy family and I have faced constant legal sabotage that the judiciary system brings up against us,\u201d says Sotoudeh, who turns 61 this month.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

But it is the regime\u2019s murderous determination to crush all dissent that pains her the most. The deaths of Mahsa Amini<\/a> in September 2022, and other young women, including 16-year-old Armita Geravand<\/a>, who was attacked by hijab-enforcing police on the metro, \u201chave been the hardest thing to endure\u201d.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Her medical leave has coincided with the government intensifying its war on women. Mass protests sparked by Amini\u2019s death have been met with violent repression by the authorities leading to hundreds more deaths and thousands of arrests. In the past month video footage of women being forcefully bundled off the streets<\/a> by the \u201cmorality police\u201d emerged as the government ratchets up its efforts to enforce the hijab with a new campaign, named Noor (meaning light); and rapper Toomaj Salehi was sentenced to death <\/a>for his support of the Women, Life, Freedom movement.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cIt\u2019s difficult to wake up one day and hear that Mahsa is dying and wake up another day and hear that she has passed away, then wake up another day and hear that Armita has died. When you see this kind of violence against your girls and women you ask: what am I supposed to do?\u201d she says.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThat\u2019s when I remember being a child and going to an amusement park and going into the tunnel of death and you would scream; that childhood nightmare has turned into an adulthood nightmare \u2013 that is how living for me feels like \u2013 living in that dark tunnel of death.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cFor women who care about this situation the only way to cope is to go about their lives.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"Nasrin
\u2018If you force us to wear this half-metre of cloth, you will be able to do whatever you want to us\u2019: Nasrin Sotoudeh at home in Tehran, September 2013. Photograph: Abedin Taherkenareh\/EPA-EFE<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

For Sotoudeh that means continuing what she has done for three decades: publicly denouncing abuses \u2013 and refusing to wear the hijab. People say life is precious, don\u2019t sacrifice your family life, but human rights and freedom are also precious<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Sotoudeh was among 20 women arrested and beaten for attending Geravand\u2019s funeral bare headed. She was later sentenced to eight years for the act, yet describes her 18 days in prison immediately after the arrest as \u201cone of the greatest experiences of my life\u201d.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cWe all went in without the hijab and came out without the hijab. I didn\u2019t even have a scarf with me, and that was amazing. I was already arrested \u2013 what were they going to do?\u201d she says.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In prison the women spent time together reading and talking, and continue to meet. \u201cWe meet in cafes, they come to my house; what\u2019s really remarkable is having that collective cause that brings everyone together. It\u2019s important to cherish that sense of solidarity.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In her early 20s Sotoudeh worked in the legal department of the state-owned Bank Tejarat<\/a>, where she wrote about human rights on a freelance basis. During this time an interview with Nobel peace prize laureate Shirin Ebadi<\/a> prompted her decision to become a lawyer and she qualified in 1995, aged 32.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Since then she has worked tirelessly for justice for women and children, defending children on death row and child victims of domestic abuse; as well as prominent activists in court, among them Narges Hosseini<\/a>, one of the women who, in 2018, removed their hijab, tied it to a stick and waved it like a flag \u2013 defiant acts captured on phones and shared on social media.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"People
Human rights activists attend a protest for Sotoudeh\u2019s release, on her birthday outside the Iranian embassy in the Hague, Netherlands, 31 May 2019. Photograph: Pierre Crom\/Getty Images<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

In the 2020 film, Nasrin<\/a>, a documentary about her life, Sotoudeh explains why the hijab is such a potent symbol of misogyny. \u201cEven if they told us today that all women are free to remove hijab when they go outside, it has no value to us. If you force us to wear this half-metre of cloth, you will be able to do whatever you want to us.\u201dIranian women violently dragged from streets by police amid hijab crackdown<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

One of the most moving moments in the film is seeing Reza bring their children to visit her in prison. Little Nima stands on a chair holding a red lollipop. Sotoudeh jokes with him behind the glass that separates them, as her daughter, old enough to understand the gravity of the situation, looks on in tears. \u201cMy son was very small when I was arrested for the first time \u2013 it bothered me that his first memory was me in prison. I used to tell him \u2018I used to play with you and do things [before I went to prison]\u2019, but he didn\u2019t remember and that broke my heart,\u201d she says.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Her grief at being parted from her children is clear in her prison letters. In one, dated September 2011, she writes to Nima, \u201cThese days I am thinking about you constantly, about how lonely you must feel and about our dear Mehraveh, who has made us proud and who is now forced to care for you and be your mother and father at the same time. I am sending you my tears of love, hoping they make the injustice of our time a little more tolerable for you.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

She has been asked on numerous occasions why she risks her family life, and her answer is the same: she can fight for what she believes in and be a mother. \u201cPeople say life is precious, don\u2019t sacrifice your family life, but human rights and freedom are also valuable and precious. So instead of sacrificing one for the other I balance them when I can.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

And her family have never doubted her. Reza shows his loyalty repeatedly in the documentary; and when prison guards handed her an \u2018apology form\u2019 to fill out and ask for forgiveness \u2013 something she would never have done \u2013 Khandan was equally adamant that she must not. \u201cMy daughter has always supported me,\u201d says Sotoudeh, Khandan\u2019s artwork on the wall behind her.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Sotoudeh\u2019s activism has been recognised internationally with numerous awards including the 2019 Council of Bars and Law Societies of Europe (CCBE) award; the 2020 Right Livelihood award<\/a> and the 2023 Brown democracy medal. This year she has been shortlisted for the Aurora humanitarian award, alongside Nobel prize-winning gynaecologist Denis Mukwege from the Democratic Republic of the Congo<\/a> and Danish-Bahraini activist Abdulhadi al-Khawaja<\/a>. The winner will be announced on 9 May. Sotoudeh won\u2019t be able to attend in person.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"Portrait
Sotoudeh is banned from practising law while on on temporary release from prison. Photograph: Jeff Kaufman\/Courtesy of Floating World Pictures<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Treatment for her heart condition, which she attributes to multiple hunger strikes, is continuing, but if the state deems her well enough, she will have to return to prison to complete her sentence. In the meantime, she works as much as she can. The ban from practising law is a huge source of frustration: it limits what she can do for people, and is her passion. \u201cI\u2019m a lawyer, my favourite thing to do is practise law, but I don\u2019t have a licence and even though I\u2019ve tried so many times, the law association has refused to renew it.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cBut that doesn\u2019t mean that I\u2019m sitting around idle,\u201d she adds.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

She has written a book on the Women, Life, Freedom movement<\/a> for Penn State University and published a collection of her prison letters. She also provides consultation for political prisoners and activists and advises colleagues.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

She perseveres because she believes that one day justice will prevail.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cWhen the hijab was made compulsory after the 1979 revolution, the majority of the people and public made it possible because they didn\u2019t have a motivation to rally against it,\u201d she says. \u201cNow, 45 years later, the majority of the public is not only against it but also has the motivation to stand up and fight against it.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

This time, she adds, women also have the support of men. \u201cWomen and men are realising that every problem is rooted in misogyny and patriarchy.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cNo one can predict the future, however, I have no doubt in my mind that this kind of violence and inhumanity against women is not sustainable.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Supported by\"theguardian.org\"<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Isabel Choat<\/a><\/p>\n

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