Armita Geravand: The young woman allegedly attacked in the Tehran subway for not wearing the veil, brain dead | International

The 16-year-old girl Armita Geravand has been declared brain dead after allegedly suffering an attack at the hands of the Iranian morality police for not wearing the hijab, Iranian media reported this Sunday. The event occurred on October 1, when at least one agent pushed her against a metal bar in the Tehran subway, according to several witnesses to the altercation, which caused a skull fracture that forced her to be hospitalized in a coma. . The Iranian authorities, however, attributed the blow to an alleged fainting of the teenager. The Iranian press has also published today the sentence to 13 and 12 years in prison for the two journalists who revealed the case of Mahsa Amini, the 22-year-old woman who died in September 2022 in police custody for wearing her veil incorrectly. Her death triggered a powerful protest movement throughout the country, harshly repressed by the Tehran regime.

On Sunday, October 1, a working day in Iran, Geravand, an art student, entered the Shohada metro station early in the morning to go to class with two high school classmates. As seen in the subway videos broadcast by the official IRNA agency, none of the three young women had their hair covered. In the images taken by one of the platform cameras, the three girls enter a car and, almost immediately afterwards, you can see Armita Geravand's friends taking her limply out of the car.

Hospitalized since then, now "monitoring" of her situation "indicates that her state of brain death is true, despite the efforts of the medical team," Iranian media such as the Irna and Tasnim agencies published this Sunday.

Several human rights organizations have highlighted the similarities in the case of Geravand and Amini. The Women, Life and Freedom protest movement, which began with the death of the 22-year-old Kurdish girl and has posed one of the greatest challenges to the Islamic Republic, is trying to remain active despite the repression. From abroad, it has received two important recognitions: the Sakharov Prize from the European Parliament for the late Amini and the aforementioned movement, and shortly before the Nobel Peace Prize for the Iranian women's rights activist Narges Mohammadi, who turns 10 years of sentence in a prison in the country.

Reprimands, fines and arrests

The Iranian Government has denied that Geravand was injured during her confrontation with the agents for not following the dress code imposed by the regime. Failure to comply with this code can lead to public reprimands, fines and arrests. Despite this, many women have violated it in protest after Amini's death.

This same Sunday, an Iranian revolutionary court sentenced Nilufar Hamedi and Elahe Mohammadi, the journalists who revealed the case of Mahsa Amini, according to the official IRNA agency. Both women were sentenced to 13 and 12 years in prison, respectively, after being accused, among other crimes, of collaboration with the US Government, acts against State security and propaganda against the system.

Hamedi was arrested after taking a photo of Amini's parents while they were hugging after learning that their daughter was in a coma. Mohammadi was arrested after writing about Mahsa's funeral in the town of Saqez, where the protests began.

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