The protests in Iran have been historic. For months, the Islamic nation has seen its people raise their voices against the regime and there’s a possibility that their demands could be heard.
The stir in Iran started in September after the death of 22-year-old Mahsa Amini, who was detained by the morality police or Gasht-e Ershad for wearing tight trousers and a loose headscarf. She reportedly slipped into a coma and died in custody, triggering unprecedented unrest. Soon the stir spread worldwide.
Iran continued to crack down on protesters, leading to more than 400 deaths and 18,000 arrests. But that did not stop people – women, students, teenagers, and even the elderly – from marching on the streets and holding anti-government rallies.
A top official has now suggested that the country’s morality police, whose conduct helped trigger months of protests, has been shut down. The morality police “was abolished by the same authorities who installed it,” Attorney General Mohammad Jafar Montazeri said, according to the news agency AFP. “Both parliament and the judiciary are working [on the issue],” he said as part of the statement.
However, the state media has dismissed the claim.
The protests that started in Iran spread across the world. Despite a crackdown Iranians have not given up and continue to raise their voice against the regime. AFP
Who are the morality police?
“Gasht-e Ershad”, or Islamic guidance patrol, are Iran’s morality police force which came into force in 2005 during the rule of then-President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, an ultra-conservative. But before Gasht-e Ershad, morality police have been prevalent in “various forms” since 1979. The force is supervised by Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei but the interior ministry has a say in its activities.
Also read: The journalist who broke Mahsa Amini’s story and the price she is paying for it
Units of Gasht-e Ershad comprise men and women, who patrol the streets in white police vans with dark green stripes. It is often monitoring spots where people gather and keep a close watch on the younger population.
The job of the morality police is to ensure that the country’s strict dress code, which requires women to wear loose clothes and cover their heads, is enforced. Those who violate the rules are given verbal warnings, sometimes detained and taken to “re-education” centres.
This is what happened to Mahsa Amini in September. She was allegedly beaten up by the morality police after being detained for “incorrectly” wearing the hijab. However, the Iranian government has denied that Amini was assaulted.
Her death and the protests that followed put the spotlight on the morality police.
Iran’s parliament and the judiciary are reviewing a law which requires women to cover their heads, which triggered deadly protests, the attorney general said on 3 December. AFP
What’s the status of the morality police?
For three months, the demonstrations in Iran have continued. The protests, which started over the hijab norms, have snowballed into anger against the regime which has been enforcing the laws.
However, there is no clarity over whether the police force has been suspended. Attorney General Mohammad Jafar was quoted on Thursday as saying Iran’s morality police had been “abolished”. He also said that the country’s parliament and judiciary were reviewing the mandatory hijab law, according to a report by Entekhab, the pro-reform outlet.
However, Iranian state media strongly pushed back on Jafar’s comments, saying the interior ministry oversees the force, not the judiciary, reports CNN.
In a report carried by ISNA, Iran’s semi-official news agency, on Sunday, lawmaker Nezamoddin Mousavi signalled a less confrontational approach toward the protests. “Both the administration and parliament insisted that paying attention to the people’s demand that is mainly economic is the best way for achieving stability and confronting the riots,” he said, following a closed meeting with several senior Iranian officials, including President Ebrahim Raisi.
Mousavi did not address the reported closure of the morality police.
Iranian Foreign Minister Hossein Amirabdollahian gave no direct answer. ”Be sure that in Iran, within the framework of democracy and freedom, which very clearly exists in Iran, everything is going very well,” Amirabdollahian said, speaking during a visit to Belgrade, Serbia.
The Associated Press has been unable to confirm the current status of the force, established in 2005 with the task of arresting people who violate the country’s Islamic dress code.
Since September, there has been a reported decline in the number of morality police officers across Iranian cities and an increase in women walking in public without headscarves, contrary to Iranian law, the AP report says.
What’s happening in Iran now?
Anti-government protests continue in Iran even amid confusion over the role of the morality police. However, it is unclear if officials will tolerate the current situation or if they will use other methods to impose the dress code, reports Al Jazeera.
The report says that the morality police is just one way of imposing the mandatory hijab law.
Scrapping the units would be “probably too little too late” for the protesters who now demand outright regime change, Roya Boroumand, co-founder of the US-based Abdorrahman Boroumand Center rights group, told AFP. “Unless they remove all legal restrictions on women’s dress and the laws controlling citizens’ private lives, this is just a PR move,” she said, adding that “nothing prevents other law enforcement” bodies from policing “the discriminatory laws”.
It’s not clear when the force would be disbanded. Some protesters believe it is nothing but a sham. It could be an attempt to appease the protesters and find one way to end the stir.
The demonstrations continue in Iran. Many women are seen across Iran, especially in Tehran, without head coverings. AFP
On Monday, only four newspapers, all from the reformist camp, referred to the stated end of the morality police, and some did so with scepticism. The Sharq newspaper asked on its front page: “Is this the end of the patrols?”
“While the prosecutor general has affirmed that the morality police have been abolished, the police public relations department has refused to confirm this abolition,” it reported. The paper added that the Tehran police head of public relations, Colonel Ali Sabahi, when asked about Montazeri’s statement, had replied: “Don’t even mention that you called us.”
Ali Alfoneh, a senior fellow at the Arab Gulf States Institute in Washington, said Montazeri’s statement about closing the morality police could be an attempt to pacify domestic unrest without making real concessions to protesters, reports AP.
”The secular middle class loathes the organisation (morality police) for restricting personal freedoms,” said Alfoneh. On the other hand, the “underprivileged and socially conservative class resents how they conveniently keep away from enforcing the hijab legislation” in wealthier areas of Iran’s cities.
With inputs from agencies
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