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“The women of Iran are showing us what feminism means”

Iranian women cut their hair and burn their headscarves.

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“The women of Iran are showing us what feminism means”

Iranian women cut their hair and burn their headscarves. The wave of protests following the death of student Mahsa Amini in Iran is not abating. Düzen Tekkal, a human rights activist with Kurdish-Yazidi roots, keeps a close eye on the current situation in Iran and is in constant contact with many local people.

WORLD: In the past few years - 2009, 2017/2018 and 2019 - there have been larger waves of protests in Iran. What distinguishes the current protests from previous ones?

Düzen Tekkal: The new dimension is the fearlessness that runs through all groups and classes of the population. The scent of freedom becomes more vehement and that weighs more heavily on people than the feeling of fear. It is doctors, teachers and students who take to the streets, above all the so-called Generation Z, i.e. the very young people. Many are protesting for the first time.

What I personally find very positive is the connection between Kurds, Iranians, Afghans and other religious groups. For the first time, a common resistance is forming beyond Iran against similar authoritarian power structures in other countries. In addition, it is new that the men stand behind the women. But of course there are still enough regime supporters, we don't have to sugarcoat that. However, I find it much worse to belittle what is happening in Iran right now.

"The Iranian regime has lost all legitimacy," says German-Iranian political scientist Dr. Ali Fathollah-Neja on the protests in Iran. Although the regime has lost the support of the lower and middle classes, international solidarity is still essential.

Source: WORLD

WORLD: Women play a very special role in the protests as the driving force. Can you describe them in more detail?

Tekkal: The women are the linchpin. Their uprising runs like a red thread through the protests across the country. They were the first to say, "Enough." Almost every woman in Iran has had her everyday experience with the so-called vice police. It's about much more than the headscarf. It's about degradation, dehumanization and gender apartheid. It's about women being ripped out of their cars in the presence of their daughters because the headscarf didn't fit properly or the mascara was too much. And the people of Iran are tired of it.

WORLD: In view of the ongoing riots, President Ebrahim Raisi announced that "the implementation of the laws could be reformed" - which laws he left open. Do you think that some could be satisfied with concessions and reforms, or is the wish for the end of the Islamic Republic more important?

Tekkal: The voice messages I get from Iran say: "We don't want any more. We don't want reforms. We want this regime to go." The Iranian people know and are fed up with the government's appeasements. Now the anger prevails. Whether in the Kurdish part or in the interior of the country, I keep getting feedback from people that they only have this one chance. That is why they continue to protest despite being harassed, arrested and killed. It's their only way to change something and that's why they need the world public.

WORLD: How do you rate the reactions from politicians in Western countries, especially in Germany? Wouldn't now be the time for Baerbock's feminist foreign policy?

Tekkal: Far too little is happening politically. It can only be the beginning to accuse the unjust regime. But if we don't change anything in the next step and continue as before, we legitimize this. It's going to hurt. We need a turning point, a new Iran policy. Negotiating a nuclear deal with those who are killing people just isn't going to work. What is happening in Iran right now and our reaction to it is the litmus test that we in Europe have to pass in terms of the credibility of human rights and women's rights.

Of course, one can make fun of terms like feminist foreign policy. But I'm more interested in the possibilities that lie within. What does it mean to make women's rights an object? That also means looking at Iran, because the women there are showing us what feminism means. Cutting your own hair is an emancipatory act of liberation.

Abir Al-Sahlani, a Swedish MEP, cut his hair off in the European Parliament. A gesture of solidarity with the protests against the regime in Iran.

Source: WORLD

WORLD: What is the symbolic power behind it and why is this form of protest so strong?

Tekkal: Cutting your own hair is an act of mourning in our culture. It is customary to place one's braid in the graves of loved ones who have died as a sign of mourning. When women now pick up scissors and cut off their hair, shave their heads, it shows: my hair, my voice, my body and my act of mourning. It is solidarity with the women who have been killed for not wearing the headscarf properly.

WORLD: When it comes to criticism of the hijab, some fear that they will serve anti-Islamic resentment. How do you feel about this?

Tekkal: These are Muslims who take to the streets. The protests are not directed against Islam, they are campaigning for women's rights, fundamental rights and self-determination. That's why there are so many men. Accusing people who criticize the unjust regime of being Islamophobic is part of the problem with our European responses over the past few decades.

WORLD: The issue of fear is omnipresent among those who are now taking to the streets in Iran, but also in your daily work. Do you have to deal with threats and hate speech yourself because of your commitment and how do you deal with it?

Tekkal: As a human rights activist, you generally do not live without danger. That sword of Damocles is always hovering over me. What helps us activists is to feel that we are not alone. And that, by the way, also helps the Iranians. Of course, the people who take to the streets there risk so much more that my own fears fade into the background. Nevertheless, fear is not to be understood separately from my human rights work, but above all how to deal with it and the realization that there are things in life that are more important than fear. Then, I believe, something like a movement will arise.

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