Return to Tehran: climber Rekabi received an enthusiastic welcome in Iran

Iranian climber Rekabi has returned to Tehran. At the airport, the athlete was greeted by a large crowd. There are great doubts about her declaration on competition without a headscarf, which was spread in the state media.

Iranian climbing champion Elnas Rekabi has returned to Tehran after reaching the final of the Asian Championships in South Korea, where she competed without the headscarf required for Iranian athletes. In the morning, a large crowd at Imam Khomeini International Airport gave her an enthusiastic welcome, video footage circulating online showed. You could hear people chanting Rekabi’s name and celebrating her as a heroine.

The case drew worldwide attention. Her appearance was seen as a sign of solidarity with the women’s movement in Iran and the protests against compulsory headscarves. However, Farsi media outside Iran and supporters of Rekabi have expressed fears that she may have been forced to leave South Korea early and be arrested in Iran – which the government in Tehran has denied.

Rekabi apologizes – doubts about circumstances

In an Instagram story from an account attributed to Rekabi, the athlete later apologized for not wearing a headscarf. “Due to an inappropriate timing and an unforeseeable call to climb” she unintentionally did not wear the headscarf. But footage from the Seoul event showed her relaxed before she climbed. They are going back to Iran in accordance with previous plans, it said.

It is unclear whether Rekabi himself wrote the post and if so, under what circumstances. Observers interpreted the apology as a forced statement. The Iranian authorities regularly put pressure on activists at home and abroad. Similar apologies are also being broadcast on state television, which human rights groups have criticized as forced confessions.

On Iranian state television, the athlete repeated statements from the Instagram post that she had accidentally forgotten her hijab.

ARD correspondent: “Such confessions have a system”

Katharina Willinger, correspondent in the ARD studio in Istanbul, explains: “Many people assume that she actually wrote this statement under duress – if she wrote it herself at all. Because such confessions and apologies, they have in the Islamic Republic actual system.” Unfortunately, Elnas Rekabi is not an isolated case.

The BBC’s Persian service, which has extensive contacts in Iran although it is not allowed to broadcast there, quoted an unnamed “informed source” as saying that Iranian officials confiscated both Rekabi’s cell phone and passport after the performance. Protests have been going on in Iran for weeks after the death of 22-year-old Mahsa Amini after she was arrested by the vice squad. Amini was accused of not wearing her headscarf properly. Rekabi’s appearance at the Asian Championships without a headscarf was interpreted as a sign of solidarity with the protesters’ goals.