Women held rallies around the globe on 8 March International Women’s Day, focusing in particular to women in Iran and Afghanistan fighting for their freedom.
Iran has cracked down on hundreds of women as protests against compulsory hijab and powers of the morality police continue in their sixth month, and Afghanistan’s Taliban has gradually banned girls from attaining an education in the country.
Protesters in London marched to the Iranian embassy, Reuters reported.
Rallies in Paris, Berlin, Beirut, Manila, Jakarta and Singapore called attention to the women in both counries, and Roza Otunbayeva, head of the UN Assistance Mission in Afghanistan, said it was “distressing” to witness the Taliban’s “methodical, deliberate, and systematic efforts” to push Afghan women and girls out of the public sphere.
Reporter Without Borders (RSF) condemned the arrest of female journalists in Iran in a statement. The journalist who visited Iranian Kurdish young woman Jîna (Mahsa) Amînî in the hospital as she fell into a coma while under custody of the morality police, Nilufar Hamedi, and the journalist who covered Amînî’s funeral, Elahe Mohammadi, both face charges of propaganda against the regime and conspiring against Iran’s national security, crimes that could have them executed.
“Women journalists have paid the price for being at the front line in recent crises,” RSF said.
RSF called for “the immediate and unconditional release of imprisoned women journalists throughout the world”, and warned the world that women were disappearing from the Afghan media landscape.
🔴Iran, Myanmar, Belarus, Afghanistan…Women journalists are paying a heavy price for being at the front line of recent crises.
Sadaf Rahimi, Afghan journalist exiled in France, spoke about the harassment of women journalists in #Afghanistan ↓ #8marchhttps://t.co/K88cBSSzdP pic.twitter.com/ZN3G382PYr
— RSF (@RSF_inter) March 8, 2023
In Pakistani capital Islamabad, Afghan refugees and women from the Hazara community took part in the march and demanded refugees’ and women’s rights for Afghans, The Guardian reported.
