After more than two months of street protests and harsh repression, the Iranian regime is sending out signals that it is considering changes in the use of the veil, which is compulsory for women in public. The country’s President Ebrahim Raisi said during a TV intervention on Saturday that while Iran’s Islamic foundations are solid, which protects the dress code, “the application of the constitution could be flexible.” At the start of the protests, Raisi had maintained a staunch rebuff against the protesters, calling for “decisive action to be taken against them”. This week the government showed some willingness to overhaul the harsh 1983 law that forces women to veil their hair or wear baggy clothing in public, and which has become a symbol of civil unrest that follows death of young Mahsa Amini on September 16 were taken into police custody. Amini had been arrested for wearing the hijab incorrectly.
Amini, of Kurdish origin, was arrested by the Vice Police, who are also in the crosshairs of the protests. Exactly, the Attorney General Mohammad Jafar Montazeri ruled on this body, who proposed its abolition without giving any further details. Neither the Interior Ministry, on which the morality police depend, nor any other official of the Tehran regime have confirmed this at the moment. “The morality police were dismantled by the same people who created them,” Mohammad Jafar Montazeri said when answering a question about the group’s dissolution, according to various agencies. “Likewise, [este cuerpo] This has nothing to do with the judiciary,” he noted, without giving any further information.
The Morality Police, known as Gasht-e Ershad (Orientation or Guided Patrols), was established in 2006 under the presidency of Mahmud Ahmadinejad, also a radical conservative who held office between 2005 and 2013. “The Culture of Decency and Hijab”. Its units are made up of men in green suits and women wearing a black chador, a garment that covers the whole body except the face, and one of their duties is to oversee the application of the dress code established by the 1983 Act Four Years after the Islamic Revolution that overthrew the Shah’s monarchy. In recent weeks, media such as the Iranian reform newspaper Shargh and citizens on their social networks have published information pointing to a reduced presence of the vice squad on the streets. A decision they interpreted as an attempt to de-escalate the demonstrations.
A group of women wearing headscarves walk through central Tehran on September 26
In his speech, the Attorney General not only suggested a possible dissolution of the committee, but also referred to the relaxation of clothing policy: “Parliament and the judiciary are working on their articulation”. Despite the statement, he also gave no details on the changes that such a reform would entail. Montazeri spoke from the city of Qom, an important Iranian theological center where the Shrine of Fatima is located; Seat of the school where the Ayatollahs are trained and a relevant pilgrimage destination. “The absence of hijab, particularly in the holy city of Qom, is one of the main concerns of the judiciary and our revolutionary society,” the prosecutor noted, “but it should be noted that legal action is the last resort.”
Although the Iranian authorities have insisted that the protests will not bring about any normative or social change, the slight nuance in the president’s tone and the actions proposed by the attorney general are seen as gestures towards the protesters, who have concentrated in every city in the country against the ayatollahs since Amini’s death. According to the NGO Iran Human Rights, almost 500 people have died and more than 18,000 have been arrested during these protests, in which the presence of women and young people is conspicuous.
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This Sunday, the demonstrators called for a three-day strike and economic boycott to begin this Monday. They will peak on Wednesday when Raisi is scheduled to attend Tehran University. The President will give a speech there as part of Student Day, a day on which there are also increased protests against the iron regime in the capital.
The United States sees no willingness in Tehran for a nuclear deal
United States special envoy for Iran Robert Malley believes Tehran has no intention of returning to the nuclear deal it signed with the international community in 2015, which has been effectively suspended since 2018 when the former US President Donald Trump unilaterally removed his country’s pact. “Iran is not interested in a deal and now we are focused on other things,” Malley said in an interview with Bloomberg.
The senior official recommends that Washington focus its efforts on “interrupting, delaying and sanctioning” Iranian arms supplies to Russia on the one hand, and supporting the anti-regime protests sweeping the country on the other: “support efforts [de derechos] Basics of the Iranian people.
The Nuclear Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) last month denounced the obstacles Iran imposes on inspecting its facilities. In fact, Tehran has demanded an end to these visits as a condition of returning to the deal. Something that is unaffordable for the US “What’s this? Why should we focus on this issue when Iran is responding with unacceptable demands?” Malley said, adding, “We can’t come back to the table to be played all the time.”
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