On June 12 this year, international women's and human rights groups expressed solidarity with Iranian women. On the same day, three years ago, authorities cracked down on a peaceful protest of hundreds of women in front of Tehran University, arresting 70 of them. The group demanded revising laws that discriminate against women.
These are the same laws that some human rights groups contend are behind the death sentence by hanging of 19-year-old Nazanin Fatehi on January 3, 2006. Her alleged crime: Killing a man who ambushed and tried to rape her.
Zahir Janmohamed, Advocacy Director, Amnesty International USA: "There are no channels for women to come forward often times if they were raped to go and say who raped her. And if she's married, then she's confessing that she engaged in sexual relations. It is forced but it is considered Zena or adultery. It brings on this whole paradox... It was a process of self defense, and they punished her for that as well."
GFX: "If Nazanin had allowed the rape to take place, she could still be imprisoned, flogged or stoned for having sex outside marriage unless four male witnesses to the actual rape would testify on her behalf." (excerpt from international petition to save Nazanin)
Nazanin along with her niece Samieh were in the company of their boyfriends when they were attacked by three men in a park west of Tehran. The boyfriends fled, but Nazanin, who was 17 at that time, and her niece couldn't. The group of men pushed them on the ground
According to the daily Etemaad, Nazanin told the court: She wanted to defend herself and her niece. She didn't want to kill that boy. She didn't know what to do because no one came to their help.
As it happened, her death sentence was overturned six months later with the intervention of Judiciary Chief Ayatollah Shahroudi... and Iranian-born Ms. World Canada Nazanin Afshin Jam. The Iranian model took up her case as a cause internationally to rescue Nazanin and other minors on death row in Iran.
GFX: Iran's death sentence of Nazanin at 17 is breaching these conventions. (excerpt from international petition to save Nazanin)
Janmohamed: "But you know, not many people are lucky to have Miss Canada defend them. The problem here is there is a culture of impunity on violence against women...That's why you see few women coming forward saying I was raped and abused... It happens in many places: in Egypt, in Saudi Arabia, in Mexico, not just in Muslim countries."
Nazanin's retrial on August 2006 was postponed to January 2007, when her lawyer received verbal confirmation of her exoneration for self-defense. But Nazanin would have to pay blood money for a pardon from the family of the deceased man who tried to rape her.
Her lawyer is appealing her case, while she's out on bail. Donations have poured in from around the world to help her cause.
But Nazanin is not alone. In Saudi Arabia, a court last November doubled its sentence for a woman to 200 lashes and six-months in prison, besides banning her lawyer from the case and confiscating his professional license. The woman was raped by seven men 14 times, in Qatif in the eastern province. Her alleged crime was being in the company of an unrelated man in a car at the time of the attack. Her action is considered a violation of the Kingdom's segregation laws. But with international pressure from human rights groups and media scrutiny, last December, the Saudi King pardoned the victim and her lawyer.
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