Armita Garawand, who was seriously injured in the Tehran subway a month ago, is dead. According to Iranian state media, the 16-year-old is said to have fallen due to low blood pressure. Human rights activists are certain: she is a victim of the moral police.
A 16-year-old Iranian girl has died after an alleged confrontation with the notorious moral police. As the state news agency Irna reported, the student Armita Garawand died yesterday in a clinic in the capital Tehran. The young woman was declared brain dead around a week ago.
Garawand was probably not wearing a headscarf
The case caused widespread outrage far beyond Iran’s borders. According to reports from human rights activists, Garawand was confronted by moral guards on a subway about a month ago because she was not wearing a headscarf.
State media denied violence by the moral police. Garawand fell and hit his head because of low blood pressure, the official statement said. The 16-year-old had been in a coma for weeks.
Case is reminiscent of Amini’s fate
Garawand’s fate reminds many Iranians of the case of the young Iranian Kurdish woman Jina Mahsa Amini, who was arrested by moral watchdogs in the fall of 2022 because of an allegedly ill-fitting headscarf. Amini fell into a coma and died. Her death sparked the worst protests in decades last year. Since then, many women have demonstratively ignored the obligation to wear a headscarf.