'Defiance To Hijab Shattered Regime’s Authority,' Says Jailed Activist

According to German media outlet Presseportal, Hossein-Ali Nayeri was admitted to a private neurosurgical clinic -- the International Neuroscience Institute (INI) -- headed by Madjid Samii, a prominent Iranian-born neurosurgeon.

Nayeri, a cleric, judge and chief adviser to Iran’s judiciary, was one of the main figures in the "death committee" responsible for the mass execution of political prisoners in Iran in 1988. President Ebrahim Raisi was also a key member of this committee. 

On July 7, Volker Beck, the president of the German-Israeli Society, notified Germany’s Federal Public Prosecutor, the Foreign Office, and the Federal Interior Ministry about Nayeri’s stay, urging them to initiate criminal prosecution measures against him.

While people are murdered and tortured to death in Iranian prisons, those responsible for the human rights violations travel to Germany with impunity, he said, stating, “This must come to an end.” He also referred to another Iranian judge -- Mahmoud Hashemi Shahroudi – who was treated in the same clinic in Hanover in 2018. 

In July 2022, Nayeri defended the massacre in an interview with the Islamic Republic Documents Center, a government entity that collects the history of the 1979 revolution and more than four decades of rule by the Islamic Republic in Iran.

He tried to justify and explain away the killing of thousands of political prisoners, saying, “The country was in a critical state. If Khomeini [the Islamic Republic's first leader] did not stand firm... perhaps the regime would have not been able to survive.”

A group of prominent Iranian human rights activists and dissidents issued a public letter and petition, urging Javaid Rehman, the UN’s Special Rapporteur on Human Rights in Iran, to secure the release of recently imprisoned political activists’ and journalists’ family members in Iran.

The letter titled “Condemning the Iranian Government’s Detainment of Political Activists’ and Journalists’ Family Members, and Discrimination Based on Ethnicity and Gender” was published in July in English and Persian. 

When asked about the letter, a spokesperson for the US State Department told Iran International, “We are aware of this case and will continue to monitor its developments. We once again call on Iranian authorities to cease the arbitrary detentions. Iranian authorities have repeatedly violated Iranians’ human rights and punished them for exercising their fundamental freedoms. “

The US spokesperson added “While charges in this case have not been announced, sham trials and executions are key components of the regime’s attempt to suppress any form of dissent.The United States continues to coordinate with allies and partners to hold Iranian authorities accountable for their human rights abuses.”

The letter noted that in early July, “news emerged of the arrest of Saman Pashai[sic]. Pashai, a Kurdish citizen and the world’s third-ranked junior wrestling champion is Sardar Pashaei's brother, a former World Wrestling Champion and national team coach. Sardar Pashai had notably spoken out against the Islamic Republic since the death sentence of Navid Afkari, a former wrestling champion in Iran and a protester against the regime.”

The letter continued: “On September 23, 2022, Latifeh Pashai (Layla Saghezi), a women’s rights activist and Sardar Pashaei’s sister, was detained and interrogated about her brother’s activities. Security agents had previously summoned and questioned Sardar Pashaei’s parents.”

Sardar Pashaei told Iran International that“By arresting my younger brother, who is a professor and a wrestling champion, the authoritarian Islamic regime is sending my family and me a message: ‘Be quiet. Don’t criticize the regime. Don’t create problems.’”

He continued that “The government's ploys to silence us, either by holding our loved ones hostage or sending its mercenaries to kill us, will not help them keep power. Iranian authorities are now using arrests and in some cases the death penalty as a tool of political repression—but we have a message for the regime: We will not give up our fight for freedom.”

According to the letter, on “June 18, 2023, agents from the Iranian Ministry of Intelligence blocked the entryway to Iranshahr in the Sistan and Baluchistan province. They subsequently arrested Amer Dadafarin, the 18-year-old son of Fariba Baluch, and Mohammad Mollazehi, the 25-year-old brother of the same, both relatives of the Baluch human rights activist. Their whereabouts remain undisclosed.“

Speaking from Britain on WhatsApp with Iran International, Fariba Baluch said “They arrested my son and brother for nothing. Just for my activities.” Baluch is an outspoken critic of the Iranian regime’s repression of people in Baluchestan.

Iranian regime security forces murdered more than 100 people in Zahedan, the provincial capital of Iran’s Sistan-Baluchistan, in the autumn of 2022 in what has become known as “Bloody Friday.”

Baluch spoke in April in the European Parliament and said: “Over 20 of those killed in the protests were children under 18. Baloch were killed, wounded, arrested and suppressed more violently than anywhere else in Iran.”

She added “Being a woman on one hand and a Baluch on the other hand, means systematic and double discrimination against them, as the women of Balochestan not only suffer from the religious government policies, but also local social/cultural oppressions more than any other region in Iran.”

The public letter was authored by Lily Pourzand, women and gender issues professional; Parvaneh Hosseini, lecturer and civil activist; Moein Khazaeli, lawyer; Samaneh Savadi, gender equality activist; Hamed Farmand, children’s rights activist; and Nasim Mogharab (Sahra), women’s rights activist.

When asked about the letter, a spokesman for United Nations Security General António Guterres referred Iran International to Ravina Shamdasani, a UN Human Rights Spokesperson for Rehman, the UN’s Special Rapporteur on Human Rights in Iran Affairs.Shamdasani did not immediately respond.

Iran International reached out to the International Olympic Committee and United World Wrestling. Hualan Jiang, a representative for the IOC, referred Iran International to the IOC press office. The IOC declined to comment. Iran International also contacted Human Rights Watch and HRW’s Director of Global Initiatives, Minky Worden, who deals with the persecution of athletes. A HRW spokesperson wrote, “We regret to inform you that we are unable to meet your deadline due to the availability of our experts. Apologies for the inconvenience this has caused, but we hope to be more accommodating of future requests. We wish the best of luck with your reporting and hope to hear from you in the future.” 

Iran International offered to extend the filing of its article to HRW to secure a comment. HRW and Worden declined to comment. Critics argue that HRW failed to intervene prior to the execution of Navid Afkari. On the day that Iran’s regime hanged Afkari, HRW issued a statement.

Local judicial authorities have announced that the clergyman's case will be referred to the provincial court for clerics. However, they also tried to emphasize that the incident resulted from a family dispute over property.

The sharing of such videos on social media is a sensitive issue for Iran's clerical regime, as many Iranians resent the power the clergy have wielded in the past 44 years since the establishment of the Islamic Republic. In recent protests since last September, there have been numerous instances of young people verbally assaulting clerics or expressing their dissatisfaction with them. In many instances young people filmed how they tossed the turban of clerics in the streets.

A judicial official in Gilan Province, where the incident occurred, has threatened to pursue those who filmed the cleric attacking the woman and promised to prosecute them.

The measures or punishment that the clerical court will decide upon are not clear, as proceedings in these courts are kept secret. Clerical courts operate independently of the Judiciary administration and function outside the legal framework.

In addition to this, another scandal that emerged earlier in the week is still causing reverberations among Iranians. A video surfaced showing an official and staunch regime loyalist responsible for enforcing hijab regulations, engaging in a sexual act with a young man. He has been fired from his job, and authorities state that he is under investigation.

Labeling this move as a “desperate attempt” by the regime to suppress women and impede the progress of freedom and equality, the joint statement published on Friday highlights the potential consequences of escalating repression and arrests.

The activists argue that the reintroduction of morality police patrols will only serve to “exacerbate the already mounting public discontent over inflation, soaring prices, and poverty, further fueling the people's anger.”

Recently, the hijab police patrols have reemerged in the capital city, Tehran, and other major urban centers, following a period of lying low, as authorities feared the potential for renewed anti-regime protests.

Notably, the timing of this development coincided with the anniversary of Mahsa Amini's death while in morality police custody, an incident that triggered widespread protests across Iran.

Despite facing brutal crackdowns, an increasing number of women in Iran have been defiantly flouting the mandatory hijab rules, which have been in place since the establishment of the Islamic Republic in 1979. This mass wave of hijab refusal has left the regime at a loss and revealed the failure of its measures.

The signatories of the joint statement emphasize that the Islamic Republic “must realize its repressive actions, especially during the summer break when universities and schools—the main pillars of the women's revolution—are in session, will be temporary and the regime will face a resolute and overwhelming backlash from the people, particularly women.”

“The enemy has not given up. They’ve said that universities are the first place where new riots should begin,” the official in charge of Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei’s representatives in universities across the country, Mostafa Rostami, said at a gathering.

In advocating for preventive measures, Rostami said, “They will completely be defeated if they can’t do something on the anniversary of last year’s riots.”

Iranian authorities always refer to anti-government protests, even peaceful demonstrations, as riots.

At the same gathering, Brigadier General Yadollah Javani, chief of the political bureau of the Revolutionary Guards (IRGC), said “vindication jihad” should be carried out in universities before the upcoming parliamentary elections in March.

In recent years, Khamenei has applied the phrase ‘vindication jihad’ (jihad tabyyin) to efforts both in the media and on social media platforms and has referred to supporters and employees active in social media as "soldiers of soft war." The term basically means propaganda efforts.

“The enemy has invested its hope in the coming months until the end of the [Iranian calendar] year [March 21]. All their evil plans will fail if we can be present in universities carrying out vindication jihad and people create an epic in March [with their presence in the elections],” Javani said.

Iranian students had a very active role in the protest movement that was sparked by the death of 22-year-old Mahsa (Jina) Amini in the custody of morality police. Since then, hundreds of students have been expelled or suspended for their activities.

At the same time, activists both inside Iran and abroad have been discussing on social media the importance of the anniversary to show the regime that the protest movement is alive and strong.

Student sources say the Supreme National Security Council (SNSC) has recently bestowed extraordinary powers to university authorities and security forces to control students and their professors, including the power to suspend those who are known to be government critics. This week, two theology professors at Isfahan University were suspended for “opposing the government and Islam”.

In June tensions grew in universities when security forces cracked down on students at Tehran University of Art protesting draconian hijab laws.

In recent months, the anti-compulsory hijab movement has gained greater momentum, particularly in universities, with many students defying the rules as a form of civil disobedience, showing up on campuses without a headscarf and wearing ordinary cloths instead of the mandatory long coverings.

“It’s ten months since the Mahsa Uprising, during which we demanded our right to life. Today, [ensuring one’s] right to life depends on recovering [lost] civil rights. We have no exit path other than resistance … because passivity in the face of exclusion would only mean perishing,” students of Tehran University said in a statement last week.

“Under various pretexts, from [non-abidance to rules of] hijab to student activity, students are maliciously deprived of their right to study even if they manage to get in,” the statement said.

Students also criticized “dual standards” that allow members of Iraq’s Hashd al-Shaabi to study in Iranian universities by the virtue of belonging to proxy militia forces but blocks “ideological outcasts” and lower-class Iranians even if they are gifted.

Critics say Iran's university admissions system heavily favors students from the wealthiest families who can afford expensive tutors and classes to prepare for admissions to top universities in highly sought-after fields.