Women face 10 years’ jail for online videos of hijab removal

Iranian officials have warned that posting video footage of women removing their mandatory headscarves in public could result in up to 10 years’ imprisonment.

The announcement specifically named the US-based social media platform of Masih Alinejad, which since 2014 has been inviting Iranian women to post pictures of themselves without the hijab. Alinejad, an Iranian journalist, has been accused by the Iranian regime of working as an agent of the US government because of the website, known as My Stealthy Freedom, which has over one million followers on Facebook. ‘‘As Masih Alinejad has a contract with the Americans, all those women who send the video footages of removing their hijab to her will be sentenced between one to 10 years of jail according to the article 508 of the Islamic Criminal Justice Act,’’ Mousa Ghazanfarabadi, the head of Tehran’s Court of Revolution, has told Fars news agency.

Earlier this year Alinejad met with Mike Pompeo, US secretary of state, who ‘‘thanked her for her bravery and continued dedication to the cause of freedom for Iranian women’’.

In recent days, the morality police in Iran have reacted to a number of incidents in which its vigilantes have been attacked in the Tehran metro while ‘‘advising’’ women not to remove their hijab. Alinejad has denied working for any foreign governments. Asked by Fars news agency if sending video clips to an individual in the United States amounted to a criminal act, Ghazanfarabadi has said: ‘‘My understanding of the law is that three types of video recordings are criminal acts: to film our military installations; to record private life of another citizen; and the third case is to record a film with the aim of working with an enemy government.’’

The hijab is mandatory in public for all women in Iran with punishment for violations usually two months’ imprisonment and a $36 fine.

– Telegraph Group