Nasrin Sotoudeh, an Iranian lawyer and human rights defender, was arrested on Sunday after attending the funeral of a young high school student who died in controversial circumstances. The authorities reportedly arrested him for “not wearing the veil” and “disturbing the mental security of society.”
Iranian lawyer and human rights defender Nasrin Sotoudeh was arrested after attending the Sunday funeral of a young high school student who died in controversial circumstances, her husband announced to AFP on Monday. “My wife was arrested during the funeral of Armita Garawand with many other participants,” said Reza Khandan, adding that Nasrin Sotoudeh had been “violently beaten”.
Arrested for “not having worn the veil”
The 17-year-old high school student, from a Kurdish region, was buried in a cemetery in southern Tehran the day after she died in a hospital after about a month in a coma following an illness in the metro. The local Fars agency announced Sunday evening that lawyer Nasrin Sotoudeh had “been arrested and handed over to the judicial authority” for “not having worn the veil” and “disturbing the mental security of society.” Since the Islamic Revolution of 1979, wearing the veil has been compulsory for women, who must hide their hair in public places.
Aged 60 and winner of the European Parliament’s Sakharov Prize in 2012, which rewards human rights defenders, Nasrin Sotoudeh has been arrested several times in recent years. She was imprisoned in 2018 after defending a woman arrested for demonstrating against the veil obligation in Iran. In 2019, she was sentenced to 12 years in prison “for encouraging corruption and debauchery.”
The circumstances of Armita Garawand’s illness are controversial. The authorities claimed that the teenager had been the victim of a “breakdown” and denied any “verbal or physical altercation” between her “and passengers or metro executives”. But, according to NGOs, the high school student was seriously injured during an “attack” on the part of members of the moral police, responsible for enforcing the obligation for women to wear the veil in public.