Increase in Femicide in Iran; Murder of '8 Women' in Two Weeks

Simultaneously with the government's violence against women in Iran on the pretext of 'mandatory hijab', based on published reports, at least '8 women' have been murdered for various motives in the cities of Mashhad, Sardasht, Khoy, Ahvaz, Shiraz, and Mahalat since the beginning of October. According to the Tehran-based newspaper 'Etemad' in its issue today, Saturday, October 15, this statistic in just two weeks is 'not a small number' and indicates that on average 'every other day, one woman or girl has been murdered.' Academic articles and theses also indicate that 'between 375 to 450 similar murders' occur annually in Iran, with these types of murders being more prevalent in provinces with a 'traditional fabric.' Statistics and news about femicide and girl murder in the Iranian government literature often come with terms like 'honor killing' or 'family disputes' to somewhat lessen the horrific burden of the atrocities and the deliberate negligence of various government sectors, including legal deficiencies, in preventing them. The human rights organization 'Hengaw' reported on October 3 that at least 52 cases of 'femicide' were registered in Iran in the first six months of this year, with '29 percent' of them occurring in Tehran. This report emphasized that at least '28 women' were killed by their husbands, 4 by 'partners' or fiancés, 3 by ex-husbands, 8 by their fathers, and 6 by their brothers. Although Marjan Keypour, director of the 'Stop Femicide Iran' website, which records cases of femicide in Iran, has questioned the official statistics released by Iranian media, she told 'Voice of America': in these statistics, the name Mahsa Amini, as well as other women who lost their lives under 'extraordinary pressures from the Islamic Republic', are not mentioned. Meanwhile, the Tehran-based newspaper 'Shargh' reported on July 14, citing 'official statistics', that from June 2021 to the end of June 2023, at least '165 women' were killed in Iran by 'one of their male family members', with 41 of those cases occurring near the capital. Accordingly, based on 'official statistics' and news published in domestic media, the statistical trend of femicide in Iran, which had been one murder every four days over the past two years, has recently escalated to one murder every other day. In a recent case, today's issue of the newspaper 'Iran' quoted Mahdi Kalami Moghadam, the public prosecutor and revolutionary prosecutor of Damghan, who reported another case of femicide in Damghan. According to this judicial official: 'Last Friday, following the discovery of the body of a 28-year-old woman under the mouth of a bridge in the Damghan to Cheshmeh Ali passage', it became clear after a few hours that 'the victim was killed by her husband due to family disputes by being struck on the head with a hard object, and her body was moved by the killer under the mouth of the bridge in the Damghan to Cheshmeh Ali route, where the young man was immediately arrested.' Mohammad Hossein Aghasi, a lawyer and legal expert in this regard, told 'Voice of America': in the previous regime (the Pahlavi regime), femicide was treated 'as murder', but now (under the Islamic Republic), the father is the 'guardian of the daughter'. Maryam Dehkordi: The culture of patriarchy, in collusion with ineffective laws, results in at least 52 cases of femicide. Marjan Keypour's criticism of the official femicide statistics in Iran: they are less than the actual number; Mahsa's name is not mentioned. The third case of femicide in the city of Mahalat in the central province: 'Yeganeh' was looking for work. The reopening of the Mona Heydari case; Rokna: The accomplice of the killer in Ahvaz committed suicide. The human rights organization Hengaw: 52 cases of femicide were registered in the first six months of this year. The 'incomplete' definition of femicide in Iran; Marjan Keypour: Mahsa Amini's name and victims of discrimination are not in the statistics. It was not suicide; it was murder; Raheleh, a 15-year-old girl, was killed by her father.