Iranian girls danger punishment for social media posts

Iranian girls informed the BBC how their on-line actions have been monitored by authorities, resulting in arrests, threats and beatings.

Iran has intensified anti-establishment protests led by girls throughout the nation after 22-year-old Mahsa Amini died in police custody two years in the past after she was arrested for allegedly not carrying a hijab correctly. monitor.

WARNING: The next article comprises descriptions of violence. Some names have been modified to guard private identities.

Like many ladies impressed by the protests, Aleph posted a photograph on social media displaying her hair flowing freely in public. It was a easy act of solidarity with the motion towards the compelled carrying of hijab.

“I am probably not involved with hiding who I’m or the place the pictures have been taken,” she mentioned. “I need to say, ‘We exist.'”

However the photograph was seen by authorities making an attempt to suppress the protests, and Alef was arrested.

She mentioned she was blindfolded, handcuffed and brought to an unknown location the place she was held in solitary confinement for almost two weeks. She was additionally interrogated a number of occasions.

Throughout one interrogation, she mentioned her interrogators tried to power a confession out of her. She was compelled handy her telephone over to masked guards, who considered her social media posts and pictures. Pictures present her attending a protest and being shot with a pellet gun by safety forces. Interrogators additionally accused her of working for the US.

Aleph was charged with “showing in public with out a headband” and “selling corruption and lewdness”.

She was discovered responsible and acquired a suspended sentence however was additionally caned 50 occasions.

“A male officer requested me to take off my coat and lie down,” she mentioned. “He took a black leather-based whip and began hitting me throughout my physique. It was painful however I did not need to present weak spot.

Her story is much like that of two different girls and a person we interviewed in Iran. Every of them informed us that they’d been detained and summoned to court docket for “anti-state propaganda”. They have been all given suspended sentences. Aleph was sentenced to probation and caning.

Two of the individuals we interviewed have been imprisoned in Tehran’s infamous Evin Jail (identified for housing many Iranian political prisoners) earlier than being tried and convicted.

Each stories describe poor dwelling situations, with prisoners crammed into small, unsanitary and chilly cells with restricted entry to showers and bathrooms, usually inflicting individuals to fall unwell.

One well-known male influencer who was detained for lower than a month informed us that his neighborhood had just one bathe room and one bathroom for about 100 individuals.

Malal, a girl who was jailed for greater than two months, mentioned that the place she was imprisoned, girls may solely bathe a few times every week. It is particularly troublesome once they’re menstruating.

“Typically they would not allow us to go to the toilet for hours,” she mentioned. “If we complain, they are saying ‘in the event you cooperate, you’ll be able to depart earlier’. We won’t get menstrual pads. We’ve to purchase them, however we do not have the cash and so they will not take cash from our home.

Kosar Eftekhari additionally combed her social media. She was arrested and charged with “anti-state propaganda,” “insulting sacred beliefs,” “disturbing public opinion” and “blasphemy.”

A month after Mahsa Amini’s loss of life, Kosar was shot within the genital space by a riot squad officer with a paintball gun. Moments later, he shot her once more, this time “with a foolish smile on his face.” She instantly heard a “pop” in her proper eye after which went blind.

The surprising incident was filmed and posted on Instagram. Regardless of her accidents and trauma, Kosar grew to become extra lively on-line, making her a primary goal for elevated surveillance.

She mentioned lots of of her social media posts, together with pictures of her with out a hijab, have been utilized by prosecutors as proof in the course of the trial.

Kosar was convicted and sentenced to 4 years and three months in jail. She was additionally banned from utilizing social media and smartphones for 5 years.

However to keep away from serving time, Kosar fled to Germany, the place she now publicly advocates for Iranian girls’s rights. Earlier this yr, she spoke to the United Nations Truth-Discovering Mission on Iran (FFMI) about her expertise and what they known as “crimes towards humanity.”

FFMI informed the BBC that “nobody needs to be jailed for posting peaceable issues on-line”.

We raised the claims of the 5 individuals we spoke with to the Iranian authorities, however they didn’t reply. An Iranian riot police commander has beforehand denied that his troops intentionally shot protesters within the face.

Iranian authorities have for years cracked down on protests and what they see as subversive exercise, together with tightening state management over individuals’s on-line lives.

They shut down the web a number of occasions and reportedly used phishing strategies to hack into telephones and entry individuals’s knowledge.

Western social media apps equivalent to Instagram, X and Telegram are blocked, however many Iranians get round this utilizing instruments equivalent to digital personal networks (VPNs), which assist them disguise their location.

The current wave of protests has been largely unfold and documented by these platforms. However because of surveillance, tens of hundreds of protesters have been arrested within the first few months.

Mahsa Alimardani, a senior researcher at human rights group Article 19, mentioned a lot of the protesters are Era Z and have a big digital footprint, which makes it potential to “monitor the protesters’ actions by social media or by their gadgets earlier than and through detention.” turns into simple.

Authorities have additionally developed instruments to assist them, equivalent to an app known as Nazer that enables government-vetted police and volunteers to report girls who don’t put on headscarves.

The nation has additionally nationalized components of the Web and incentivized it by decreasing the price of Web entry. However utilizing it means handing over private knowledge to the federal government.

Two years on from Mahsa Amini’s loss of life, which has reverberated throughout the nation, Ladies Free for Life’s digital resistance exhibits no signal of stopping.

“Now we regularly discuss our experiences within the Ladies’s Liberation Motion in our household and buddy circles. It is just like the seeds of a flower. Even when a flower withers or dries up, its seeds will proceed to bloom elsewhere,” Allais mentioned. Husband mentioned.

Further reporting: Shayan Sardarizadeh