Iranian President Ebrahim Raisi said on Saturday that the hijab is the law in Iran after a viral video showed a man throwing yogurt at two unveiled women in a shop near a holy Shi’ite Muslim city.
After the death of Mahsa Amini, an Iranian-Kurdish woman in the custody of Iran’s morality police in September 2022, growing numbers of women have defied authorities by discarding their veils after nationwide protests.
Judicial authorities in a town near the northeastern city of Mashhad issued arrest warrants for the man seen pouring yogurt over the heads of two women, a mother and her daughter. They were also the subject of arrest warrants for flouting Iran’s strict female dress rules, state media reported as quoted by Reuters.
“If some people say they don’t believe (in the hijab) … it’s good to use persuasion … But the important point is that there is a legal requirement … and the hijab is today a legal matter,” Raisi said in live remarks on state television.
Authorities said the owner of the dairy shop, who confronted the attacker, had been warned, according to Reuters report.
Judiciary chief Gholamhossein Mohseni Ejei earlier threatened to prosecute “without mercy” women who appear in public unveiled, Iranian media reported.
“Unveiling is tantamount to enmity of (our) values,” Ejei was quoted as saying by several news sites.
