Iranian Women Take a Step Forward

[Rosemary House]

"For all the gloom of events in Iran today, this is still a time of hope for women, as their campaigning has had a slow but sure effect."
To anyone who's followed the recent progress of women's rights activists in Iran, the violent crackdown on pro-Mousavi protesters by the police and Basiji militia is entirely unsurprising. It's surely only the presence of unusually large numbers of international journalists that has held them back from even more unrestrained violence.

The situation is still in enormous flux but already one can hazard a few theories about what this election might mean for Iran's women.

First, the overt political articulation of an agenda for women's rights is surely significant. The outspoken assertion by Mir Hossein Mousavi and his wife Zahra Rahnavard that Iranian women need far greater rights and freedom may, in the short term, go down in flames with the Mousavi campaign in general. But surely some of their appeals – for an end to the aggressive attentions of the morality police, greater participation in the world of work and politics for Iranian women and a move away from legalised gender discrimination – will surely have registered with Iran's upper echelons (the guardian council, even the supreme leader).

Heather Harvey: The Guardian