PARIS: Activists in Iran and Western nations on Monday rejected a claim that the protest-hit Islamic republic was disbanding its notorious morality police, insisting there was no change in women’s rights.
Iranian shops closed in several cities on Monday, following calls for a three-day nationwide strike by protesters, nearly three months after a nationwide wave of unrest began by the death in custody of the 22-year-old Kurdish-Iranian woman, Mahsa Amini. Meanwhile, the head of the judiciary accused what he called “rioters” of threatening traders.
“Nothing we have seen suggests Iranian leaders are improving their treatment of women and girls or stopping the violence they inflict on peaceful protesters,” the US State Department said. GermanyThe Foreign Ministry said Iranian protesters “want to live freely and in self-determination”, and that disbanding the vice police, “if implemented, will not change that”.
In a surprise move this weekend, Iran’s attorney general Mohammad Jafar Montazeri reportedly said that the vice squad units had been closed.
But campaigners were skeptical of his comments, which appeared to be an off-the-cuff answer to a question at a conference rather than a clearly flagged announcement by the Home Office. “Unless they remove all legal restrictions on women’s dress and laws controlling citizens’ privacy, this is a public relations move,” said company co-founder Roya Boroumand. american Abdorrahman Boroumand Center advocacy group, said.
Abolishing the force, activists say, would mark no change in Iran’s headscarf policy, but rather a change in tactics to enforce it.
Iranian shops closed in several cities on Monday, following calls for a three-day nationwide strike by protesters, nearly three months after a nationwide wave of unrest began by the death in custody of the 22-year-old Kurdish-Iranian woman, Mahsa Amini. Meanwhile, the head of the judiciary accused what he called “rioters” of threatening traders.
“Nothing we have seen suggests Iranian leaders are improving their treatment of women and girls or stopping the violence they inflict on peaceful protesters,” the US State Department said. GermanyThe Foreign Ministry said Iranian protesters “want to live freely and in self-determination”, and that disbanding the vice police, “if implemented, will not change that”.
In a surprise move this weekend, Iran’s attorney general Mohammad Jafar Montazeri reportedly said that the vice squad units had been closed.
But campaigners were skeptical of his comments, which appeared to be an off-the-cuff answer to a question at a conference rather than a clearly flagged announcement by the Home Office. “Unless they remove all legal restrictions on women’s dress and laws controlling citizens’ privacy, this is a public relations move,” said company co-founder Roya Boroumand. american Abdorrahman Boroumand Center advocacy group, said.
Abolishing the force, activists say, would mark no change in Iran’s headscarf policy, but rather a change in tactics to enforce it.
