A New Image of Women in Iranian Cinema?

Iran's hard-line Cultural Revolution Council has prepared a so-called plan to restrict the presence of women in cinema. The body is aiming at offering a model religious and national image of Iranian women in cinema. In its meeting last week with Iran's ultra-fundamentalist president, the social and cultural committee of the Council decided to implement a plan for an "improved presence of women in cinema" in less than a month and inform all the government institutions of this.

This measure comes along with other restricting policies on movie productions that have recently been adopted by the Council. Keeping a tight rein on the presence of women in cinema comes after a recent decision by Saffar Harandi, the fundamentalist Minister of Culture banning women to stay on their jobs after 6:00 pm. Many women's rights activist had warned of new restrictions on women's lives. The decision followed strong media reactions which initially forced the Ministry's general director to withdraw the statement. But in his televised interview, the fundamentalist Minister raised the issue again and even defended it.

In his statement, Harandi refers to the key role of women in the promotion of an Islamic society and the necessity of their presence in “the warm atmosphere of the family” to play the important role of a wife and a mother.

The media has not yet been informed of the details of the new plan. The Ministry Internet website however, reports that it is going to improve the presence and image of Iranian women based on high religious and national values.

For the past two decades, Iranian women have established numerous powerful social movements. These movements which are the fruits of tireless efforts of women, have ignored government restrictions and have benefited from comprehensive methods to attain their social rights. And even though the idea of the "decent housewive" has long been favored by the rulers, the reality of Iranian society is a different story that has forced even the fundamentalists to withdraw their extremist views. Such withdrawal was well manifested in the recent presidential election where even hard-line Ahmadinejad could not open reveal his true ideas on women’s rights during his campaign, even though he doesn't appear to feel obliged to fulfill his election promises.

Last August, the Council formed a committee consisting of different ministries and government bodies to promote the culture of piety among women. The national dress code plan was another initiative to restrict women's rights and one can assume how such plans will impose further barriers in the social lives of Iranian women.

NGO Crackdown in Iran

Iran's hardline Interior Ministry has decided to control and crackdown the NGOs by preparing a list of groups that it claims are planning to overthrow the Islamic regime. Conservative Qods daily has exposed a plan by the ministry to deal with Iranian NGOs. Based on Qod’s report, the Interior Ministry has accused some NGOs of misusing money, supporting members of the former government of Khatami and secretly communicating with foreign agents.

During the last days of President Mohammad Khatami's reform government, Ashraf Boroujerdi, social affairs deputy at the Interior Ministry had stressed the existence of plans to fight NGOs and their so-called activities against Iran's national security.

It seems that through the news regarding the interior ministry's list of NGOs, the fundamentalist and hardline government of Ahmadinejad is exposing its strategies aimed at slaughtering the NGOs.

With 20 million votes, Khatami became the first president after the revolution who regularly and systematically emphasized on the establishment of a civil society in Iran. Eight years ago the media and political analysts took note of the call for the establishment and institutionalization of a civil society in Iran. In order to institutionalize the reform movement in Iran, Khatami's aides advised him to pay more attention to non-political and civil institutions and paved the way for the formation of NGOs that blossomed in Iran's short-live reform period. A Ministry of Interior official asserts that more than 10,000 active NGOs were established during Khatami's eight-year presidential term. During the last months of Khatami's government, the interference of semi-military and security shadow groups, prevented the activities of many NGOs while also intimidating activists through interrogations and even arrests.

But things have come a long way and have changed drastically since the victory of the current hardline administration. Instead of strengthening the status of the NGO, some government officials today call for strengthening the religious and Islamic organizations. In the same light, the new government has shown a familiar intolerance towards the media and non-government political and student organizations, threatening them with closures and suspension of activity.

A number of media editors too have expressed their concerns over the crackdown of NGOs and have called the pressures a plot to limit the free flow of information between Iranian institutions that operate in the global intellectual arena.

This confrontational attitude and policies have raised the concerns of social activists as well. They believe these intuitions will form the foundations for social and civil justice, and eventually pave the way for people's participation to protect their rights and interests.

Ahmadinejad's hard-line government does not believe in NGOs and prefers to provide the masses with ideology and rather than with modern organized organizations. The plot to crackdown such activities revealed itself when the government announced its plan to formally review the legal files of the NGOs.

A Serial Murderer of Women?

Following the murder of three more women, in separate incidents, in Tehran, Iranian families are again troubled by the events. The murdered women, Mitra, Mina and Shohreh are the recent victims of serial killings in Tehran. One wonders if the killing of women that has been going on in other Iranian cities has now moved to Tehran. During the last two months, bodies of two young girls murdered by knife stabs were found on Tehran highways. Police calls the killings serial because there is a similar pattern in all of them.

The commander of Tehran’s law enforcement force has said that all three victims were dressed in formal outfits and their bodies show no signs of any resistance. He added that the crime scenes indicated that the victims were threatened to death by their murderers and had been tied with red ropes, finally killed by knife stabs to their necks.

Similar killings had occurred in the past two decades and the truth behind those murders was never revealed. In the period between 1980 and 1984, 43 women were killed. In the early years of Iran's 1979 revolution, bodies of female victims that were killed by white rope around their necks were found in Oroumieh, Tabriz, Karaj, Tehran and Lahijan. Five years after those murders, a man who had confessed to 43 murders committed suicide in prison.

The murder of 19 women in the religious city of Mashad in the summer of 2000 was one of the most controversial serial killings in Iran. Investigators claimed that the murderer who had killed the 19 women in a period of one year had strong religious beliefs. Officials announced that the criminal had claimed that his motivation for the murder of the women was to combat moral corruption. He was put on trial and hanged in the summer of 2001.

In the mid-90s, “Night Owl” was the most controversial serial murderer of Tehrani women. He was later charged with killing 9 females in the west of Tehran. He eventually accepted responsibility for the murders, was put on trial and hanged while the reality behind his motives was never revealed to the public and media, as he was reported to have had some connection to certain government offices from where he obtained the photographs of the women victims. One of the bizarre aspects of the trial was that some of the ultra-conservative newspapers were sympathetic to the murderer on the justification that what he was doing was fighting immoral women.

The three recent victims are all from well-off Tehran families and police suspects that because all three worked for Gold Quest Company, all three had their computers stolen, and all had put separate ads in the morning newspapers for the sale of their houses, the murders are connected and the criminals must be the same individuals.

Officials have not provided media with additional details of the killings to clarify some of the mysteries of the case. The ambiguities however have caught the attention of the media and some have focused on the history and details of earlier murders of women for clues. Fifteen years ago when Salam newspaper first reported suspicious elements in the murders of women at the time, the press was not keen on following the cases up. But since the revelations of the serial killings of the Ministry of Intelligence about ten years ago, such murders are now reported as being organized murders. While such a conclusion has never been officially supported, the fact that the case of one of them, an air stewardess by the name of Fatemeh Ghaem-Maghami whose body was found inside her car on Passdaran Avenue, was never pursued raised more questions of possible involvement of some organizations in the murder.

Resumption of Press Crackdowns

The suspension of Asia daily and Baran Nour (Rain Light) biweekly by the order of the ultra-hardline new agency overseeing the Iranian press has deeply disturbed the local media. The newspaper was closed last week on charges of printing photographs of the founder of the German Burda clothing journal.

The press has once again been coming under pressure from officials of the Ministry of Guidance whose agents have called journalists and editors of newspapers asking them or threatening them to stay in line with official policies. These threats and meddlings have been protested by the professional guilds and human rights groups in Iran.

In recent years, the conservative judiciary had shut down tens of publications and the suspension of Asia is perhaps a sign of the return to those pre-reform days. In 1997, the election of reform-minded Mohammad Khatami as president helped Iran’s press experience a short-lived flourishing period of freedom that was later reversed through the harsh crackdowns by the judiciary. When Hossein Saffar Harandi, a former editor-in-chief of Kayhan newspaper was appointed the new Minister of Culture, observers had warned that knowing his views on the press, a crackdown would almost certainly follow. Four months to that day, the first closures attest to those predictions.

Before 1997, press supervision was in the hands of the Press Monitoring Board, which used its powers to shut down many publications. Then the judiciary took the initiative of revoking publication licences and shutting down newspapers. Now, the duty seems to have fallen back onto the Ministry of Culture.

Heyate Nezarate Bar Matbuat or the Press Monitoring Board at the Ministry of Culture and Islamic Guidance is officially responsible for issuing operational licenses or permits for newspapers. The Board is made up of a judge appointed by the head of the judiciary, the Minister of Culture or his representative, a managing media editor selected by the media, a university professor appointed by the Minister of Higher Education, a religious teacher appointed by the Qom Theological School, and a member of the Cultural Revolution Council. The Minister of Culture chairs the board.

The supervisory board is considered one of the main tools of press crackdown in Iran. Even though it enjoyed less power and influence during Khatami’s moderate government,
it was behind the mass closures of publications during the same period, thanks to the militant press judge and with the help of the hardline judiciary. During Khatami’s 8-year presidency that is considered moderate and where open and intense battles raged between moderates and hardline conservatives, each invalidated and challenged the efforts of the other camp to curtail its goals. More than a 100 publications were shut during the period and more than 1337 journalists were prosecuted, many seeing prison terms.

The recent press crackdown, conducted by the government and not the judiciary, is proof that Ahmadinejad’s hardline government has not toleration for a critical press.

The closure of Asia has once again brought on the controversy as to who can shut down a publication, the Press Monitoring Board or the Judiciary.

A senior lawyer told Rooz that the Board has no legal jurisdiction to suspend publications, adding that all it can do is to refer what it considers to be violations on the part of a publication to a court of law, in which it may request the revocation or suspension of a license. Nemat Ahmadi, the lawyer for some of the suspended publications actually goes even further and argues that Iran’s press law is against the constitution and that the suspension of newspapers is an illegal punishment. Tehran judiciary deputy, on the other hand, contends that the country’s constitution allows the judiciary to prevent violations of the press on its own initiative. Reza Jaafari says: “The law allows government agencies to punish perpetrators in order to prevent violations, even though these reprimands are different from what the judiciary can exercise.”

These days there is now even talk of creating a board to oversee the work of news agencies, which is most likely going to be used, or misused, in the similar fashion that the current Press Monitoring Board has been dealt with.

Government to Control Attire

A member of Cultural Committee of the Majlis (Iran’s Parliament) says a committee in the Ministry of Culture plans to control Iranian fashion and clothes people wear. The creation of this committee gains importance because radical and conservative newspapers including the Jomhurie Eslami voiced complaints about what Iranian women wore in the West Asia sports competitions in Doha during the first 10 days of December.

The ultra hardline daily claims that people were upset when they saw photos of Iranian women runners in the press and on internet sites. “The wearing of extremely tight clothes and those with short sleeves by Iranian female athletes focused the attention of foreign media on them, leading to extensive reporting of the issue,” wrote Jomhurie Eslami. It criticized Iranian sports officials for allowing this to happen.

Following the Jomhurie Eslami report, Mohammad Rahbar, the ultra-conservative cleric and Majlis MP from Isfahan who has taken up the task of designing a uniform dress for Iranians also criticized the tight outfits and public participation of women who in his words wore clothing that “reveals the feminine features of the human body” to outsiders. He also warns textile manufacturers and distributors of women’s clothing to take his advice seriously and not undermine the culture of society.

Imposing a dress code has a long history in Iran. It began seventy years ago when women were forced to remove their hejab (prescribed clothing in Islam that covers everything except the face of a woman in public). But history has shown that Iranian women are very fashion conscious and thus strive to be fashionable while the government’s efforts to cover them up has not had much success in internalizing its code. During the last three decades the Islamic Republic has taken every measure to force Iranian women to wear or observe the Hejab. But to little avail. More recently, the arrests and punishments of those who did not fully practice the dress code have waned as women continue to defy the morals police and the imposed official dress code.

Despite the warnings by individuals who have read their history on the reactions to such practices, the plan to come up with an official Islamic dress code and control the way Iranian’s follow fashion has once again emerged on the agenda of the fundamentalist Majlis MPs. Even common folk nowadays say that the days when governments dictated their taste onto the public have long gone, and that the new efforts will be as unsuccessful as the earlier ones. Analysts point out that even the generation of Iranians who grew up after the Islamic revolution and was witness to the hejab, in addition to the constant propaganda on the issue, does not accept the government imposition.

Many observers believe that the events of the last 5 years in Iran, ranging from the students crackdown to the imprisonment of political activists, show that the government has been trying to copy the Chinese model of social control. What is happening now regarding women’s clothing was predicted by many when the new hardline administration that is supported by conservative clerics won the elections in June 2005.

A conservative female MP recently stressed that the Majlis committee will support clothing manufacturers that follow the dress codes in their clothing products. She appears confident that the plan to present a national Islamic dress code will be welcomed by Iranians which will be presented to the public through permanent and seasonal fashion exhibitions with an eye on all Muslim countries, not just Iran.

Rahbar warns that the dress code will be enforced in schools, universities, and work places, and that everyone will be obliged to observe them. He believes that Iranian girls have become street dolls which he says has no foundation, and thus legitimacy, in Iranian or Islamic culture. He scorns Iranian men's indifference that allows women to dress the way they do and believes the forthcoming dress code program will eradicate the moral corruption in society.

Strikes Follow Police Arrests

Three days after ten Sherkate Vahed (the company that provides bus services to Tehran) employees and members of the workers union were arrested, Tehran on Sunday witnessed one of it’s the largest workers protests since two decades ago. News agencies reported the number of participants to be anything between 2,000 to 5,000 and said the strike paralyzed the city’s transportation life. Following the strike, the judiciary released some of the detainees. But new arrests were later claimed by some of those released.

Following the resumption of the work of the workers syndicate of Sherkate Vahed, some of its leaders were arrested in Tehran last week. Mansour Osanloo, the union worker and Ibrahim Madadi, Alizad Hossein, Akbar Yagoobi, Re Boorboor, Hamid Reza Rezaifar, Javad Kefayati, Seyed Javad Sidvand, and Morteza Kasari are among those who remain detained. The arrests began on Thursday morning and continued throughout the day as police rounded up the activitists at their home or anywhere it would find them. They have been charged with creating an illegal syndicate.

The next day, many syndicate members staged a sit-in in front of the syndicate offices and other leaders called on the workers to start a strike in support of the arrested union members and refrain from going to work.

The Sherkate Vahed workers syndicate was born in 1989. It remained banned for the next 25 years but resumed its work just one year ago. When Sherkate Vahed fired 18 union employees last year, the union protested the move. In the words of Ibrahim Madadi, the deputy teamster who is now under arrest, the syndicate protested the firing on the grounds that what the workers were requesting was the promised but unfulfilled rights of the workers. Sherkate Vahed workers used other means to communicate their discontent and demands. For example on designated dates, they kept their bus headlights on during the day – an unusual practice in Iran. They also held talks with Sherkate Vahed managers, but were threatened and violently confronted. “We continued to be denied our overtime payments, were subjected to unnecessary change of assignments or bus routes, were denied due promotions, were repeatedly summoned, etc,” Madadi said.

When company mangers refused to reinstate the fired workers, more workers joined the union as they saw it pushing for their interests. Then Sherkate Vahed managers called in law enforcement officials to stop the activities of the syndicate.

On Thursday morning when security agents went to arrest eight union leaders, the press was told that the arrests were because these individuals had formed an illegal workers union. Other workers and their leaders hoped that those arrested would soon be released, which turned out differently: six more were arrested immediately. This led the syndicate leaders and the members to conclude that arresting syndicate leaders must have been on the agenda of higher government officials. These arrests followed the many strikes by workers who had not been paid for months in the past.

Sherkate Vahed workers syndicate was particularly interesting to officials because their methods of expressing their demands and protests were being copied by other worker groups. They used all non-violent means available to them simultaneously, rather than in succession. They used their lights, did not take tickets from passengers, filed suits in courts, wrote letters to government officials, held sit-ins, etc to attract the attention of others in their struggle. These measures made the union more popular in the eyes of the workers which in return weakened the effectiveness of the government unions or workers associations.

Contrary to the days when arrests of political and social activists, journalists, writers, etc were supported by other sections of society, this time the strike of the bus drivers was not widely supported, even though a few other guilds expressed their solidarity with striking workers.

Iran’s writer’s guild released a statement of support for the striking workers, condemning the arrest of the union leaders and workers. In the statement it reveled that syndicate members had been beaten up in their offices earlier because of their syndicate work, some were stabbed and one worker even had his tongue cut in the brawl that followed. The statement calls on the Iranian nation to join them in their drive to attain the right of association for all sections of society.

Daftare Tahkim Vahdat, the largest student organization too issued a statement of support for the workers and their syndicate, calling on officials to release the imprisoned workers.

Mohammad Seyf, a renown lawyer in Tehran and a member of the Kanoone Modafean Hogooge Bashar (Center for the Defense of Human Rights) told the press that the cause for the arrest of the union members is not acceptable. “No court has ruled that the Sherkate Vahed syndicate was illegal, therefore to arrest people on that charge is in itself a violation,” he said. “Until such a court ruling is make, the syndicate is legal.” It should be noted that the 25 year ban on the activities of the syndicate too was not the product of a court of law after a hearing and a fair trial, i.e. the due process of law, but due to mafia tactics on part of authorities.

Tehran’s newspapers published the news of the workers strike only after Tehran City Council chairman, Chamran, announced that the demands of the workers were not just professional, but also had political content. He also claimed, contrary to what workers have said, that all the dues of the Sherkate Vahed workers had been paid. It should be noted that the chairman is a former military commander who enjoys the status of presidential advisor to president Ahmadinejad. “The syndicate is illegal, even though the proper response to it did not take place some 6 or 7 years ago,” he said. He confirmed that the strike had created transportation problems for the city, despite the efforts of the company to bring in back-up drivers. But he also distanced himself from the actual arrests and the way they were carried out by saying the City Council had nothing to do with it and is not responsible for the way the strikers were handled. According to him, the decision to arrest the workers was made at the Provincial level.

Political observes have noted that this is the most serious confrontation between workers and government officials during the last two decades. In the past most of the official attacks were against cultural organizations and so this is the first violent handling of an association which comprises workers blue-color workers. He doubted this measure would produce the desired results the government was after.

A workers activists told Rooz that even though workers movement remained passive during the last two decades, it continued its life nevertheless. “The existence of millions of dissatisfied workers is like having a box of explosives ready to be ignited. It is not wise to push things to shove at this time especially as the workers were testing the promises of the new president’s calls for justice,” he said