‘UN Women’ Should Unequivocally Revoke Invitation for Iran to Serve on Executive Board
By: Sara Hassani (PhD student in politics at The New School for Social Research)
When world leaders entered negotiations with Iran over a contentious nuclear deal, they were adamant that human rights would not factor in to their policy decisions.
In fact, many proponents of the deal objected to claims that the rapprochement had anything at all to do with human rights, citing instead their concerns over global security and nuclear non-proliferation. The by-products of this engagement, however, tell a different story.
In April of this year, the U.N. Economic and Social Council quietly elected Iran to a 3-year seat on the executive board of UN Women, a body created by the United Nations General Assembly in July of 2010 to oversee matters related to “gender equality and the empowerment of women.” Set to come into effect in January 2016, the decision has garnered little attention in the media, presumably for the incredible uproar it would incite.
Serving as the United Nations’ leading body tasked with advancing gender equality around the world, UN Women is intended to uphold the minimum values set out by The Convention on the Elimination of all Forms of Discrimination Against Women, or CEDAW. While the Convention was adopted in 1979 by the General Assembly, it should come as little surprise that Iran did not ratify, let alone sign, the international bill of rights for women. Ironically, that same year marked a turning point in Iranian politics; one that saw Iranian women subject to newly instated ‘Sharia’ law and that secured their widespread and systematic discrimination both at the juridical and social levels.
Summarizing just some the elemental concerns to be had with this decision, U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations, Samantha Power, underscored the following:
“In Iran, women are legally barred from holding some government positions, there are no laws against domestic violence, and adultery is punishable by stoning, making it wholly inappropriate that Iran assume a leadership role on women’s rights and welfare at the U.N.,” (Reuters, April 10, 2015)
The very measures prescribed as means to ‘ward off’ unwanted sexual attention often encumber women with even worse forms of daily harassment.
Worse yet, the Iranian government has executed countless women like Reyhaneh Jabbari simply for having defended themselves against sexual assault. Under the new penal code, Iran’s courts rarely qualify the testimonies of women in Reyhaneh’s position as admissible; Instead, they require that at least one male had witnessed the purported crime, which affirms their belief that a woman’s testimony bears only half the juridical value of a man’s.
Iran fares just as poorly with respect to women’s issues in the public sphere. In an annual ‘Global Gender Gap’ report released by the World Economic Forum (WEF), Iran ranked 134th of the 140 countries surveyed – attesting to the government’s measurable failures vis à vis women’s empowerment in politics, economic participation, education and health. This news comes at a time when female youth unemployment in Iran has skyrocketed and while recent changes, like those announced by Iranian police officials in 2014, ensure that women in Iran are effaced from the public sphere, formally banning their employment in coffee shops, coffee houses, and traditional Iranian restaurants. Though far from unusual, these gendered bans disallowing Iranian women from partaking in daily-life are steadily on the rise. Just last September, 13 of Iran’s 34 provinces banned women from appearing on stage as part of a musical ensemble.
Documenting the nuanced double-bind facing Iranian women, a recent article in the Guardian did well in demonstrating how the very measures prescribed as means to ‘ward off’ unwanted sexual attention often encumber women with even worse forms of daily harassment:
“The irony of a system that goes to great lengths to “protect women’s bodies” is that while harassers are acting freely, stalking and groping under the eyes of all, the moral police is arresting women for “bad hijab”, skimpy manteaus or tight leggings.” (Guardian, September 15, 2015)
Bringing to light the disproportionate burden shouldered by Iranian women, these and other accounts have revealed how women’s rights have in fact worsened since Rouhani’s presidency began in 2013. Steadfast in their bravery, Iranian women who regularly fend off patriarchal aggressions in the form of virginal testing, acid attacks, and rape – both as a means of intimidation by public officials and as a means of torture – must also defend themselves against the brutalities of the government’s Morality Police who routinely detain women on charges of what they deem to be shameful and immoral dress in public, which typically speaks to the Islamic code effectuated by Iran’s former Supreme Leader Ayatollah Khomeini.
While the western world stands doe-eyed, enamored with the recent deal struck with Tehran, we must seriously question whether rapprochement with one of the world’s leaders in human rights violations can, realistically, come without a price. The simultaneous ‘softening’ of global governance institutions like UN Women vis à vis Iran on matters pertaining to women’s empowerment and women’s equal access to human rights are undoubtedly cause for concern.
Let us not be mistaken, Iranian women’s resistance is alive and well, and this is hardly a call for saviors. However, while Iranian women are left fending for themselves against crude and often violent misogyny, our global governance institutions – specifically, those charged with women’s equality and empowerment – should not legitimize the Iranian regime’s track record and treatment of women by inviting them to oversee their own objectionable and abhorrent behavior. Iran’s oversight of its own nuclear activities may have satisfied policy-makers, but the international human rights community cannot afford to accept similar standards in terms of Iran’s systemic misogyny. UN Women should unequivocally and without delay revoke its invitation for Iran to serve on its executive board until necessary and effective changes are made.
http://blog.movements.org/oped-un-women-should-revoke-iran-invitation/
