OMM Redaksiyası
An Iranian appeals court has upheld a sentence of 74 lashes against prominent singer Parastoo Ahmadi for performing without the mandatory hijab, her lawyers said, according to the BBC.
Ahmadi, 29, sang in a sleeveless dress during a concert livestreamed on her YouTube channel in December 2024. Iranian law requires women to cover their hair and wear modest clothing, while public performances by women are prohibited.
The judiciary launched proceedings after the video went viral and received millions of views, describing the performance as a violation of Iran’s “legal and cultural regulations”.
Appeal rejected without a hearing
A criminal court in Qom reportedly convicted Ahmadi and eight members of her band and production team in June. The charges included “offending public decency” through the publication of “obscene and indecent material”.
Alongside the 74 lashes, the defendants were banned from audiovisual activities and from leaving Iran for two years.
The defendants’ appeal was “rejected” by a higher court on Friday without a hearing, according to their lawyers.
“In our view, holding the concert was not a crime at all,” one of the lawyers told the BBC. The lawyer said the trial court had imposed one of the harshest available punishments, despite having the option of issuing fines or less severe penalties.
The lawyer added that the appeals court appeared to have upheld the ruling to deter similar performances in the future.
Rights groups condemn flogging sentence
The initial sentence prompted widespread reaction on Iranian social media. Exiled singer Googoosh called for an end to restrictions on women’s freedom to choose how they live and dress, while musician Hossein Alizadeh said he was willing to receive 70 lashes in Ahmadi’s place.
Amnesty International condemned the sentence, warning that flogging is “cruel, inhuman and degrading punishment” and violates the prohibition on torture and other ill-treatment.
In January 2024, Kurdish-Iranian activist Roya Heshmati was flogged 74 times after being convicted of “violating public morals” over a social media photograph showing her without a hijab. She said a female officer forcibly placed a scarf over her head at a prosecutor’s office in Tehran before a male officer whipped her shoulders, back, hips and legs, according to Kurdish rights group Hengaw.
Iran’s continuing hijab crackdown
Iran’s dress code is based on the country’s interpretation of Sharia. It requires women and girls above the age of puberty to cover their hair and wear loose-fitting clothing that conceals their figures.
In 2022, nationwide protests followed the death in custody of Mahsa Amini, a 22-year-old Kurdish woman detained by morality police in Tehran for allegedly wearing her hijab “improperly”. Women removed or waved their headscarves during demonstrations against Iran’s clerical establishment. Hundreds of people were killed in the subsequent security crackdown.
Since then, many women and girls have stopped covering their hair in public in defiance of the dress code. Authorities have responded with arrests, warnings, business closures and other measures.
Earlier this month, conservative politician and Expediency Council member Gholamali Haddad-Adel said that Iran’s war with the US and Israel meant authorities could not focus on hijab enforcement “as much as we should for the time being”.
The war began at the end of February, weeks after Iranian security forces violently suppressed another wave of mass protests triggered by the country’s economic crisis, killing thousands of people.
