Iran Country Reports on Human Rights Practices - 2001 Released by the Bureau of Democracy, Human Rights, and Labor of State Department-USA, March 4, 2002

IRANIAN WOMEN'S BRIEF # 53

May 2002
Contact person: Behjat Dehghan

.....Women....

Although spousal abuse and violence against women occurred, statistics regarding such abuse are not available publicly. Abuse in the family is considered a private matter and seldom is discussed publicly. Rape is illegal; however, the law rarely is enforced, and rape is a widespread problem. The Special Representative noted in his September 2000 report that media reporting on the situation of women has diminished…
          
Prostitution is illegal. Information regarding the extent of the problem is not available. A girls' center in Karaj reportedly was involved in the trafficking of girls ….
Women have access to primary and advanced education;however, social and legal constraints limit their professional opportunities. In September 2000, the Majles approved a controversial bill to allow single women to travel abroad for graduate education.

The Council of Guardians was considering the legislation at year's end. 
The State enforces gender segregation in most public spaces, and prohibits women mixing openly with unmarried men or men not related to them. Women must ride in a reserved section on public buses and enter public buildings, universities, and airports through separate entrances. Women are prohibited from attending male sporting events, although this restriction does not appear to be enforced universally. While the enforcement of a conservative Islamic dress codes has varied with the political climate since the death of Ayatollah Khomeini in 1989, what women wear in public is not entirely a matter of personal choice. The authorities harass women if their dress or behavior is considered inappropriate, and women may be sentenced to flogging or imprisonment for such violations. The law prohibits the publication of pictures of uncovered women in the print media, including pictures of foreign women. There are penalties for failure to observe Islamic dress codes at work .

Discrimination against women is reinforced by law through provisions of the Islamic Civil and Penal Codes, in particular those sections dealing with family and property law. Shortly after the 1979 revolution, the Government repealed the Family Protection Law, a hallmark bill adopted in 1967, that gave women increased rights in the home and workplace, and replaced it with a legal system based largely on Shari'a practices. In 1998 the Majles passed legislation that mandated segregation of the sexes in the provision of medical care. The bill provided for women to be treated only by female physicians and men by male physicians and raised questions about the quality of care that women could receive under such a regime, considering the imbalance between the number of trained and licensed male and female physicians and specialists.

In October 2000, the Parliament passed a bill to raise thelegal age of marriage. Guardians rejected the bill in November 2000 as contrary to Islamic law. Nonetheless, even under the law, marriage at the minimum age is rare. All women, no matter the age, must have the permission of their father or a living male relative in order to marry. The law allows for the practice of Siqeh, or temporary marriage, a Shi'a custom in which a woman or a girl may become the wife of a married or single Muslim male after a simple and brief religious ceremony. The Siqeh marriage may last for a night or as little as 30 minutes. The bond is not recorded on identification documents, and, according to Islamic law, men may have as many Siqeh wives as they wish. Such wives are not granted rights associated with traditional marriage. The Penal Code includes provisions that mandate the stoning of women and men convicted of adultery . Women have the right to divorce, and the grounds on which a woman may seek a divorce include proving that her husband is addicted to drugs or that he has not supported her for extended periods. However, a husband is not required to cite a reason for divorcing his wife. In 1986 the Government issued a 12-point
"contract" to serve as a model for marriage and divorce, which limits the privileges accorded to men by custom and traditional interpretations of Islamic law. The model contract also recognized a divorced woman's right to a share in the property that couples acquire during their marriage and to increased alimony rights. Women who remarry are forced to give up to the child's father custody of children from earlier marriages. However, the law granted custody of minor children to the mother in certain divorce cases in which the father is proven unfit to care for the child, such as in cases in which the father suffers from drug addiction or has a criminal record. Muslim women may not marry non-Muslim men. The testimony of a woman is worth only half that of a man in court. A married woman must obtain the written consent of her husband before traveling outside the country.

In his August report, the UNSR reported that poverty severely impacts women and that there are about one million single-mother families, and that 29 percent of the families below the poverty line are single-mother families. In addition, 70 percent of the single mothers in rural areas are illiterate….



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