Iranian human Rights Lawyer Nasrin Sotoudeh Sentenced to 38 years, 148 Lashes, Husband Says

That should teach Iranian women to shut up and go back to being invisible!

The joys of being a woman in Islam!

Sotoudeh has represented opposition activists

and women who removed mandatory headscarf

Thomson Reuters ·

Nasrin Sotoudeh's husband, Reza Khandan, wrote on Facebook that she had been given a sentence of

decades in jail and 148 lashes, unusually harsh even for Iran which cracks down hard on dissent and

regularly imposes death sentences for some crimes. (Arash Ashourinia/The Associated Press)

Nasrin Sotoudeh, an internationally renowned human rights lawyer jailed in Iran, was handed a new sentence on Monday which her husband said was 38 years in prison and 148 lashes.

Sotoudeh, who has represented opposition activists including women prosecuted for removing their mandatory headscarf, was arrested in June and charged with spying, spreading propaganda and insulting Iran's supreme leader, her lawyer said.

She also was jailed in 2010 for spreading propaganda and conspiring to harm state security — charges she denied — and was released after serving half her six-year term. The European Parliament awarded her the Sakharov Prize for Freedom of Thought.

Official sources are giving a different story. A judge at a revolutionary court in Tehran, Mohammad Moqiseh, said on Monday Sotoudeh had been sentenced to five years for assembling against national security and two years for insulting Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, the official Islamic Republic News Agency reported.

Sotoudeh's husband, Reza Khandan, wrote on Facebook that the sentence was decades in jail and 148 lashes, unusually harsh even for Iran, which cracks down hard on dissent and regularly imposes death sentences for some crimes.

The news comes days after Iran appointed a new head of the judiciary — Ebrahim Raisi, a hardline cleric who is a protégé of Supreme Leader Ayatollah Khamenei. The appointment is seen as weakening the political influence of President Hassan Rouhani, a relative moderate.

Iran, often accused of human rights abuse, said on Monday it had allowed UN Deputy High Commissioner for Human Rights Kate Gilmore to visit Iran last week at the head of a "technical mission."

The visit, confirmed by a UN official, appeared to be the first in many years by UN human rights investigators who have been denied access by the government.

The UN investigator on human rights in Iran, Javaid Rehman, raised Sotoudeh's case at the UN Human Rights Council in Geneva on Monday, saying that last week she "was reportedly convicted of charges relating to her work and could face a lengthy prison sentence."

"Worrying patterns of intimidation, arrest, prosecution, and ill-treatment of human rights defenders, lawyers, and labour rights activists signal an increasingly severe state response," Rehman said. 

International Day of the Girl and Iran Jails Girl for Showing Hair in Public

Iran sentences ‘Girl of Enghelab Street’ to 24 months

for removing headscarf in public

Women showing their hair in public in Iran are usually

sentenced to two months or less and fined $25

The protests are inspired by the actions of a 31-year-old woman, now dubbed the "Girl of Enghelab Street" who was arrested in December when she took off her headscarf and held it in the air while standing on a pillar box in Central Tehran.Video grab of "The Girl of Enghelab Street", allegedly identified as Vida Movahed.

The Associated Press

TEHRAN, Iran — A Tehran prosecutor says a woman who removed her obligatory Islamic headscarf in public in late December has been sentenced to 24 months in prison.

Girls showing hair corrupts Islamic men

Iran’s semi-official Tasnim news agency on Wednesday quoted prosecutor Abbas Jafari Dolatabadi as saying the unidentified woman took off her headscarf in Tehran’s Enghelab Street to “encourage corruption through the removal of the hijab in public.”

In February, police detained 29 women who removed their headscarves as part of an anti-hijab campaign known as “White Wednesdays.”

The police say the campaign, advocated by Farsi-language satellite TV networks based abroad, purportedly encourages women participants to take their white headscarves off on Wednesdays.

Women showing their hair in public in Iran are usually sentenced to far shorter terms of two months or less, and fined $25.

God help women if they should ever become visible in Islamic society!

Saudi Woman Wearing Miniskirt in Video Arrested Following Public Outcry **UPDATE**

As I have pointed out a few times, Islam is progressive, not progressive in a liberal sense, quite the opposite. Islam progresses toward more and more strict Sharia, or Sharia-like attitudes until women are made virtually invisible.

**UPDATE**: Several news agencies are reporting today that the girl has been released without charge.

Video sparked Twitter backlash, with many saying she broke country's strict dress code for women

The Associated Press

A woman is filmed walking around a historic fort in a miniskirt with no one else around. The short video was shot in a village in the desert region of Najd, where many of Saudi Arabia's most conservative tribes and families are from.

A woman is filmed walking around a historic fort in a miniskirt with no one else around.

The short video was shot in a village in the desert region of Najd, where many of Saudi Arabia's

most conservative tribes and families are from. (Khulood/Snapchat)

A Saudi woman has been arrested for defying the kingdom's strict dress code by walking around in a miniskirt and crop top in a video that sparked public outrage.

The woman, whose name was not given, was detained by police in the capital, Riyadh, for wearing "immodest clothes" that contradicted the country's conservative Islamic dress code, state media reported Tuesday. Police referred her case to the public prosecutor, according to the official Twitter account of state-run TV channel al-Ekhbariya.

In the video, which has gone viral since first emerging on Snapchat over the weekend, the woman is filmed walking around a historic fort in a miniskirt with no one else around. The short video, shot in a village in the desert region of Najd, where many of Saudi Arabia's most conservative tribes and families are from, is followed by other shots of her sitting in the desert.

The video sparked a Twitter hashtag that called for her arrest, with many saying she flagrantly disobeyed Saudi rules, which require all women living in the kingdom, including foreigners, to wear long, loose robes known as abayas in public. Most Saudi women also wear a headscarf and veil that covers the face.

In other words, for women to be invisible in public.

Social media is wildly popular in Saudi Arabia as a space to vent frustrations and gauge public opinion. The outcry against the video and the woman's subsequent arrest reveal how powerful and widespread conservative views are in the kingdom, despite recent moves by Saudi Arabia to modernize and loosen some rules.

The country's 31-year-old heir to the throne, Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, has pushed for greater openings for entertainment in part to appease the youth, who are active on social media and can bypass government censors online. More than half of Saudi Arabia's population is under 25.

The government announced last week that girls would be allowed for the first time to play sports in public school and have access to physical education classes. The powers of the kingdom's religious police have also been curtailed, and they are officially no longer allowed to arrest people.

This is a clear attempt to reverse some of the stringent application of Sharia. It will be interesting to see if it leads anywhere. The reaction on Twitter would make it seem that loosening moral codes is not a a popular idea.

Despite these moves, strict gender segregation rules and other restrictions on women remain in place. Women are not allowed to drive in Saudi Arabia and cannot obtain a passport or travel abroad without a male relative's permission.

After the woman's video surfaced, some Saudis expressed alarm, saying that Twitter was being used as a tool to out other citizens.

Saudi writer Waheed al-Ghamdi wrote on Twitter that while the woman violated Saudi laws, her actions did not warrant such an outcry because they did not harm others.

Ivanka Trump, left, and Melania Trump are seen at the Arab Islamic American Summit in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, in May. Some have noted the two women did not cover their heads or wear abayas. (Evan Vucci/Associated Press)

"I am simply questioning the lack of priorities regarding anger and alarm expressed over human rights violations and oppression versus the harmless personal choices of others," he wrote.

Some of those defending her posted images from U.S. President Donald Trump's visit to Saudi Arabia in May, in which his wife Melania and his daughter Ivanka, though modestly dressed in higher necklines and longer sleeves, did not cover their heads or wear abayas.

The woman's image was blurred on Saudi news websites reporting on the case. It is common in Saudi Arabia to see heavily blurred or pixelated images of women's faces on billboards and storefronts — in stark contrast to the many towering images of senior male royals displayed across the country.

Of course, can't have women with faces! They wouldn't be invisible!

The 6 second video can be seen here