By Tom Gross
In honor of International Women’s Day, I also repeat the following item from yesterday’s dispatch:
Iranian security forces on Sunday arrested 33 women’s rights activists rallying outside a Teheran court where a group of their fellow campaigners were standing trial for having demonstrated last year. The 33 were taken to the notorious Evin prison, which has the largest number of political prisoners in Iran and where many prisoners say they have been tortured.
The arrests on Sunday were part of a crackdown against political activity by women and protests in general since President Ahmadinejad came to power in 2005.
Five women were standing trial for organizing an “unauthorized” rally to ask for equal rights for women. Seventy people, most of them women, were arrested at the protest last June when they called for improved rights and changes to laws discriminating against women. Under Iranian
law, married women have to go through a lengthy process to be granted a divorce, and the testimony of two women is equal to that of one man.
Today marks International Women’s Day, and some western NGOs (predictably) use the occasion to attack Israel and America. Next year they might want to try criticizing the following practices against women, which are widespread in the Muslim world:
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1. Female Genital Mutilation (FGM)
2. Trafficking of women
3. Incest
4. Honor Killings
And instead of attacking Israel, they also might like to demand the rights of women to:
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1. Freedom of religion
2. Education
3. Free speech
4. Participation in the electoral process
