Iran doubles down, rolls out tougher hijab punishments
The new set of orders appear to be a message to protesters that the Islamic Republic is making no retreats in the face of months-long nationwide protests.
The office of Iran's prosecutor-general issued a series of new directives Tuesday to the country's police to act "decisively" against women who fail to comply with the country's controversial hijab rules.
The ISNA news agency quoted Deputy Prosecutor-General Abdolsamad Khorramabadi as saying that police will be obliged to arrest and hand over to the judiciary women who remove their headscarves in public. Outlining detailed penalties, he said those women could face detention from 10 days to two months, while other measures were also at the disposal of judges, including a range of bans on work and political activity as well as banishment and confiscation of vehicles.
The new hijab penalties announced by the Iranian judiciary come against a backdrop of unprecedented defiance from women frustrated by decades under the draconian rules. Despite the repressive measures in recent months, an increasing number of them, especially in Tehran, have been going about their public daily lives without their hijabs, not to mention twirling and burning headscarves at protests. Those gestures have triggered calls from regime loyalists for the forceful "return" of headscarves.
The new laws will go even further concerning those found to be "encouraging" lax hijab, landing them up to 10 years in prison for moral "corruption," according to the deputy prosecutor.
