Iranian students protest college’s compulsory hijab policy and ‘morality’ enforcers
Iranian students protest college’s compulsory hijab policy and ‘morality’ enforcers
Students at Tehran University demonstrated on Monday against the Iranian institution’s policy of coercing women to wear hijabs.
The headscarf – or hijab – is required in public for all women in Iran. Those who violate the rules are usually sentenced to two months in prison or less and fined around $25.
The Center for Human Rights in Iran, or CHR, said on its website that the catalyst for the protest was the university’s deployment of “female agents” on campus to enforce the “Hijab and Chastity Program.”
CHR said that the agents, also referred to as “morality police,” are volunteers who operate under the auspices of Iran’s military Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, and that “its members are often seen harassing and beating people at public places.”
The protesters, who included men as well as women, briefly scuffled with another group of Tehran University students who support the country’s conservative dress code.
“Forcing and compelling a certain kind of clothing on students is a flagrant affront against their privacy, a blatant violation of their human rights, and an outright injustice toward female students,” the National Council of Student Guilds said in a statement that CHR published.
“Such confrontations will only cause tension on campus and shut the doors of reason at a time when universities need to be a place of calm and coexistence among everyone with different ideologies and lifestyles,” added the statement.
The Islamic Republic News Service, or ISNA, said that a university official unsuccessfully tried to address the anti-hijab protesters.
Tehran University Vice President Majid Sarsangi said that there were no agents on campus looking to enforce the wearing of hijabs.
One student, Majid Dorri, tweeted that the agents physically assaulted the protesters, keeping them from reading a statement against forcing the wearing of the hijab.
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