1,000 Hours of Free Medical Visits and 14 Free Deliveries Sentenced for ‘Removing Hijab’
A court in Alborz Province sentenced a female obstetrician and gynecologist to one year of free medical visits and performing free delivery operations in lieu of one year of imprisonment, for standing on top of a police vehicle and “removing her hijab.”
According to ISNA news agency, Rasoul Ahmadzadeh, judge of the fourth branch of Chaharbaagh General Court in Alborz, announced on Thursday, September 25, that “contrary to some judicial precedents that have considered hijab removal as propaganda activities against the system, this court did not recognize this matter as a security crime.”
Nevertheless, the court sentenced the woman to one year of imprisonment, but considering “the defendant’s personal and social condition, scientific and professional competence,” the court replaced her punishment with “1,080 hours of free public service through free medical visits once a week and performing free obstetric procedures twice a month, prioritizing those with financial constraints and subject to complete religious hijab, and authoring a research article titled ‘The Rate of Compliance of Female Physicians with Religious Hijab in Iran’ and submitting an acceptance certificate with its printed version published in credible scientific journals approved by the Ministry of Science, with a rating of very good or good, to the criminal sentences enforcement unit.”
According to Rasoul Ahmadzadeh, after the defendant’s vehicle was stopped by traffic police, the defendant stood on the roof of the police vehicle and, by removing the scarf from her head and waving it, protested what she claimed was a vehicle stop due to improper hijab.
Yesterday, an image was also released of a young woman in Urmia who was sitting on top of a police vehicle. The law enforcement announced that she “took this action after police warning” about hijab and “was immediately arrested by officers.”
Hours after this announcement, a video was released in which the young woman expressed remorse.
In recent years, the detention of women by “guidance patrols” and law enforcement’s treatment of those protesting mandatory hijab have repeatedly made headlines.
Source: Radio Farda
