The authorities of Iran They arrested this Saturday the two organizers of a marathon on the southern island of Kishin which the day before they participated women without veil contravening the rules of the Islamic Republic. One of the detainees is an official from the Kish free zone and the other works in the private company that organized the test, as announced by the Mizan judicial agency.
The Kish prosecutor, Ali Salemizadeh, stated last night that despite the advance warningsthe organizers of the race “did not respect religious, social and professional laws and principles” in holding the race, in reference to the participation of women without hijab, reports the Tasnim agency.
Salemizadeh maintained that career development “damaged public morality”so he announced a response “firm, dissuasive and without leniency” against all those involved, including local authorities of Kish. The prosecutor assured that the Judiciary will act against any “negligence or lack of attention to the rules.”
The athletic competition, held on Friday, included 5, 15 and 42 kilometer events and brought together more than 5,200 athletes in the male and female categories.
Dissemination on social networks
After the wide circulation of images of the competition on social networks, conservative agencies such as Mehr and Tasnim described the test as “cultural threat” and denounced the “unveiled presence” of female runners, demanding strict measures to avoid the repetition of similar episodes.
The incident comes amid growing pressure from conservative politicians to reimpose the use of the hijabafter many women stopped using it on the streets as an act of civil disobedience.
The movement began after the death in police custody of the young Kurdish woman Mahsa Amini in September 2022, after being arrested for not wearing the veil properly, which unleashed months of protests in the country shouting “women, life, freedom”, which even called for the end of the Islamic Republic and were extinguished with harsh repression that caused some 500 deaths.
On Tuesday, a total of 155 hardline parliamentarians – out of a total of 290 – sent a letter to the president of the Iranian Judiciary, Gholamhosein Mohseni-Ejei, to request a “stricter and more determined” application of the laws on the mandatory use of the Islamic veil due to the increase in women without hijab in society.
Promotion of “indecency”
Two days later, the head of the Iranian judiciary declared that the current situation regarding the hijab “must not continue” and noted that intelligence agencies have been tasked with identifying organized currents that “promote indecency and the lack of use of the veil”, and the Police to confront “flagrant crimes”. “In some cases, the infraction is obvious: the person appears semi-naked or naked. In such cases, legal action will be taken,” he indicated.
In the streets of the country there is a clear relaxation of strict female dress standardswith long hair in the air without a veil, skirts and tank tops, after the Government of the reformist president Masud Pezeshkian has stopped applying a strong hand against women who do not wear the veil.
Although Parliament approved a law last December on the chastity and the hijab that sought to impose severe penalties on women who do not respect the Islamic dress code, the Iranian Supreme National Security Council, chaired by Pezeshkian, stopped its application, considering that it would cause “unnecessary conflicts” in the divided Iranian society.
