By Isciane Genuist

On Saturday, November 2, Ahou Daryaei, a 30-year-old French literature student, removed her clothes for a few minutes in front of her university in Tehran, the capital city of the Islamic Republic of Iran. This act was deeply symbolic in a country where women are required to wear body-covering clothing to hide their forms and a veil to cover their hair. After the militia tore her clothing during a confrontation, Daryaei removed what remained in protest on the Azad University campus, then walked around briefly before being forcibly taken into custody. Ahou Daryaei was beaten and harassed by security agents who belonged to the Basij militia. Her act, which was filmed by some students and shared on social media, symbolizes the wish for freedom and rights equality in Iran.

Eyewitnesses cited by Reuters, reported that Ahou Daryaei was violently detained by members of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC), an militia in Iran, who interned her in a psychiatric hospital leaving her with severe injuries to her head. However, the Iranian government gives a different version. According to the official Iranian press agency FARS, she suffers from “severe psychological distress” and wore “inappropriate clothes” during classes while security agents asked calmly to change her attire. According to Mona Jafarian, cofounder of Femme Azadi and questioned by Le Parisien, she declared that these accusations are common in Iran. The Islamic Republic evokes the “maladies of moving” where women supposedly exhibit an uncontrollable urge to display their hair and bodies. Amnesty International, a Non-Government Organization in defense of human rights, has called for Daryaei’s immediate release. 

Ahou Daryaei’s story recalls the mass demonstrations that followed the death of 22-year-old Masha Amini while in police custody two years ago after she was detained for wearing her veil improperly. Following these events, many demonstrations were launched across the country and created the movement “Women, life, freedom” leading to arrests. This revolt provoked the death of 551 people, thousands of imprisoned people, and 10 people condemned to death. In May of this year, Iranian President Ebrahim Raisi died in a helicopter crash, and was succeeded by Masoud Pezeshkian. He is considered as a reformist president, current political minority movement that wants to promote moderate change inside of the Islamist system. Since July, Pezeshkian has increasingly voiced support for women’s rights, including their choice of dress and opposition to the morality police. He pledged that women, even those who choose not to wear a veil in public, would no longer be harassed by the police, and promised to remove the morality police from Iran’s streets, a groundbreaking stance since the 1979 Islamic Revolution and one aligned with the “Women, Life, Freedom” movement. 

However, doubts remain over whether Pezeshkian can implement these reforms due to resistance from Iran’s powerful judiciary, the Revolutionary Guards, and influential religious authorities, who continue to uphold strict dress codes and other controls on women.