Rape of young girl in Iran met with muted response
The incident is raising questions of a double standard media censorship in Iran.
In late June, the Reformist Iranian paper Ghanoon reported an eyewitness account of a gang rape of an 11-year-old girl under a bridge in Tehran. Due to pressure from judicial officials, news outlets have not been able to follow up on the case and the crime was unfortunately largely overshadowed by the nuclear negotiations between Iran and world powers. Nevertheless, this tragic incident once again brought the issue of violence against women to the Iranian public’s attention.
Shahrzad Baba-Alipour, a journalist covering social issues for Ghanoon, interviewed a witness to this rape in a June story titled “I can’t say what I’ve seen.” News of the atrocious incident quickly circulated on Iranian social media, prompting several members of parliament to react. However, law enforcement authorities have up until now stayed silent about this crime.
A number of conservative members of parliament have expressed their sorrow about this crime and promised to follow up on it. “It is not a simple matter,” Rasool Hazari, a member of the parliament’s Committee on Public Health, told the news site Tabnak. “In a country that prides itself on being Islamic and following authentic Islamic culture, we cannot so simply look past this crime.”
Similarly, Javad Jahangirzadeh, a member of the parliament’s National Security Committee, characterized this incident as a “heinous event” and called for it to be dealt with seriously. “The authorities have to be responsive about this case,” Jahangirzadeh said, “I promise I will follow up on it.”
