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Features

Women’s Rights Activist Accused of Being Anti-Family

November 7, 2018
Mahrokh Gholamhosseinpour
6 min read
After 67 days in detention for teaching women about their rights, Homa Amid was released on November 5
After 67 days in detention for teaching women about their rights, Homa Amid was released on November 5
Najmeh Vahedi was arrested for holding workshop to teach women about their rights and their options
Najmeh Vahedi was arrested for holding workshop to teach women about their rights and their options

On Monday, November 5, after 67 days in “temporary” detention, Hoda Amid, a lawyer and women’s rights activist, was released on bail. Her brother Reza Vahedi confirmed the release on Twitter the next day.

Amid was arrested for the dubious crime of “attempting to overthrow the family” through running workshops to teach about “the conditions of a marriage contract” and “equality in housework.”

Revolutionary Guards’ Intelligence Organization agents arrested Amid and three other women’s rights activists — Najmeh Vahedi, Maryam Azad and Rezvaneh Mohammadi — in September 2018. All four were accused of similar charges.

Hoda Amid and Najmeh Vahedi, a sociologist, were arrested on the morning of September 1 at their homes. On September 3, Rezvaneh Mohammadi, a gender student studies, was also arrested at her home. And on September 25, security agents arrested women’s rights advocate Maryam Azad, a graduate of dramatic arts at Tehran’s Imam International Khomeini Airport after she had boarded a plane to Istanbul.

Rezvaneh Mohammadi spent 25 days in solitary confinement and was repeatedly interrogated before she was transferred to the women’s ward at Evin Prison. She was released on bail on October 28 after 44 days in detention but is still reported to be in detention.

Najmeh Vahedi was arrested for running legally authorized and public workshops to teach young couples about equality in housework, and about the legal rights and responsibilities stipulated within marriage contracts. Despite the fact the workshops had been given approval by relevant authorities, the judiciary accused her of “creating an association to overthrow the family.” One women’s rights activist based in Tehran described the charge as “really strange.”

 

Second-Class Citizens

Under the laws of the Islamic Republic, wives are second-class citizens. For example, by default, a wife cannot travel abroad without the permission of her husband. Furthermore, a husband can prohibit his wife from working in an occupation he deems to be “against family values” or “harmful to his or her reputation.” Some, although not all, discriminatory laws can be overcome by including specific provisions in the marriage contract, a legal practice similar to a prenuptial agreement.

“After 60 days of the temporary detention of my sister and after several hours of waiting, Evin Court announced that the examining magistrate has gone to [the Iraqi holy city of] Karbala for Arba'een [a religious holiday],” tweeted Reza Vahedi on October 29. “May God reward him.”

Vahedi had tweeted that on September 1, at the same time security agents arrested his sister, they also confiscated all mobile phones and computers belonging to other members of the family. They were told that the confiscated items would be returned to them in 48 hours, but they were not. “When I asked the examining magistrate” about them, Vahedi said, “he laughed and said that maybe they meant 48 days. But by then my sister had been under arrest for 58 days.”

Not only were the detained women’s rights activists not permitted to call their families or meet with them, they were denied the right to choose their own lawyer. According to sources close to them, they were forced to choose a lawyer from an approved list of 20.

 

The Reformed Law that Punishes So-Called Security Cases 

Article 35 of the constitution of the Islamic Republic states unequivocally: “In all courts, both parties to the claim are entitled to select a lawyer for themselves.” And Article 48 of Iran’s Code of Criminal Procedure confirms the right of the accused to a lawyer. However, this article was amended in 2015, severely limiting the right for a defendant to choose his or her own lawyer in cases arbitrarily deemed to be “security-related.” A note added to the article states: “In cases of crimes against internal or external security, and in cases involving organized crime...during the investigation phase, the parties to the dispute are to select their attorneys from a list approved by the head of the judiciary.” At the moment, this list is comprised of only 20 “approved” attorneys.

“During her detention, Najmeh Vahedi was permitted to contact her family only three times,” an informed source told IranWire. “Members of her family have not been allowed to meet her except once, when the prisoner’s mother and sister were permitted to visit her for a few short minutes.”

According to the source, Najmeh Vahedi’s mother is unwell and, as a result, the family asked for her older brother to be allowed to visit her in prison instead of her mother — but the request was denied. “It is interesting that the presiding judge at Evin Prison told Najmeh’s family that their daughter was limited in whom she could meet and that she could meet only with her parents once every 20 days,” the source said, “but the examining magistrate who is also based at the same Evin Prison claims that he has issued no such ruling.”

Keep Quiet

The source also told IranWire that the families of the detainees have been warned against talking to media outside Iran. “The detainees have been told not to talk to the members of their own families about their case or the charges against them,” the source said, and then added: “Najmeh would never do something illegal. All her activities were done legally and in the open and were related to her field of sociology. She was trying to give free counsel to women who have been victims of violence and abuse or do not correctly understand their rights. Najmeh is a totally transparent person and pursues a series of logical and humane demands that in no way violate the laws. But it seems that raising the awareness of women who are victims of violence — even within the limits of these defective and ineffective laws — is not in the interests of a certain totalitarian group.”

Not much is known about Maryam Azad, another of the detainees. She is 30, a native of Shiraz and a graduate of dramatic arts. She has been behind bars for more than 40 days but it is not yet clear who arrested her and what the specific charges against her are.

 

More on the fight for women’s rights in Iran:

Internet to Blame for “Bad Hijab”, October 30, 2018

Women’s Rights Activists behind Bars, October 1, 2018

Friends Fear for Activist 50 Days after he Started Hunger Strike, September 18, 2018

Husband of Prominent Lawyer Arrested, September 5, 2018

The Saga of an Iranian Peaceful Activist, August 30, 2018

Human Rights Lawyer Charged With Assisting Spies, August 16, 2018

Decoding Iranian Politics: The Struggle Over Compulsory Hijab, May 1, 2018

Guards Arrest “Revolution Woman” Maryam Shariatmadari, April 27, 2018

Exclusive: Interview with Revolution Woman Narges Hosseini, March 2018

Khamenei Dismisses Hijab Protesters as “Insignificant and Small", March 2018

Anti-Hijab Protester Sentenced to Two Years in Prison, March 2018

The Regime’s Tactics Against Iran’s “Revolution Women”, February 2018

People Want the Choice on Hijab — But the Regime Won't Listen, February, 2018

The Man Who Joined Revolution Women, February, 2018

Iran’s Prosecutor Dismisses Hijab Protesters as Childish and Ignorant, January, 2018

More Women Protest by Removing their Hijabs, January, 2018

The Woman Who Stood Up Against Forced Hijab, January, 2018

 

 

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