The Swiss Foreign Ministry defended the decision by its ambassador in Tehran, Nadine Olivier Lozano to wear the full body veil, the chador, on a visit to Qom yesterday (Wed) following global outrage claiming the undermined five months of protests against the compulsory hijab.
Léa Zürcher, the Foreign Ministry spokesperson, claimed the ambassador had visited the holy city of Qom to attend an interfaith event at an unnamed university. Zurcher claimed “a short visit to an important religious site took place” and “the applicable dress protocol for women was followed”.
However, the black chador which covers the whole body, is not required of visiting female foreign dignitaries who can simply wear a long headscarf at the site.
Social media was flooded with condemnation, including leading political voices around the world who said the move flew in the face of global support for the protests which were sparked by the death in custody of Mahsa Amini, arrested by the morality police for the inappropriate use of her hijab. The nationwide protests have since seen hundreds killed and thousands more arrested since September in brutal crackdowns by security forces.
Hillel Neuer, Executive Director at Human Rights Watch, tweeted: "Meet Nadine Olivieri Lozano, Swiss Ambassador to Iran and star of the murderous regime's propaganda. While women in Iran are being beaten, blinded, tortured, raped and killed for daring to protest the compulsory hijab laws, she is complicit in her head-to-toe chador and hijab."
The Swiss embassy, responding to the global outrage, denied the move undermined the human rights aspect of the protests which deny women the basic right to choose how to dress.
“Switzerland repeatedly and clearly takes a stand on human rights violations in Iran,” Zurcher added. “In recent months, it has repeatedly and unequivocally condemned the use of violence against the demonstrators at various levels and also called on the Iranian authorities to choose the path of de-escalation and to seek dialogue with the demonstrators.”
During the visit, Lozano is seen with several clerics, gifted a religious book from one of the shrine’s caretakers at Iran's second most holy city, after Mashhad, home to the biggest and most prestigious of Iran's Shiite seminaries. Qom has been at the center of controversy for years, its institutions being disproportionately funded, not least, while the country is suffering from a bitter economic crisis.
Institutions such as the Al-Mustafa International University attract foreign students from countries across China, Africa and Latin America, teaching them the foundations of Shia Islam to take back to their countries, at the expense of the Iranian people, while millions of Iranians cannot afford to eat or heat their homes during the bitter winter months.
Masih Alinejad, a leading Iranian activist in exile, whose life was recently threatened by the country's security forces, called the ambassador’s decision “shameful” and a “betrayal to Iranian women”.
She tweeted: “While teenagers & women are getting beaten, jailed & killed for saying NO to forced hijab, NO to gender apartheid regime, Swiss ambassador in Iran obeyed forced hijab …Switzerland must respond why they took side with our killers.”
The Secretariat of the Assembly -- also translated as the Assembly of Experts of the Leadership or as the Council of Experts – issued a statement on Wednesday, reiterating obsequious remarks about Khamenei.
In their statement, the members of the assembly described Khamenei as a force of “solidarity and national unity," and decried the slogans and slurs that are chanted against him during popular protests for over five months.
Members of the Assembly are elected from the inner circle of the regime and people very close to the Khamenei, which explains their full loyalty. The assembly – which is in charge of supervising, dismissing and electing the Supreme Leader – can run for election after being vetted by the Guardian Council, whose members are, in turn, appointed either directly or indirectly by the Supreme Leader.
The Guardian Council is composed of six Islamic law experts, selected by the Supreme Leader, and six jurists, nominated by the Chief Justice, who in turn, is also appointed by the Supreme Leader. Therefore, it is a self-serving closed-circuit system that ensures all key constitutional position are occupied by loyalists.
Interestingly enough, the head of both bodies is hardliner cleric Ahmad Jannati, who turned 96 on Wednesday, a day after he was re-elected as the chairman of the Assembly of Experts for another two years. First Deputy Chairman of the assembly is President Ebrahim Raisi.
The assembly’s statement repeatedly glorified Khamenei, claiming that the "unprecedented large volume of propaganda and insults" against him indicates that the enemy understands his important role in “guidance and management of society.”
The statement also reiterated calls for the preservation of "hijab" -- or Islamic dress code -- as a clear message of the Islamic revolution and one of the "elements of the identity of the Islamic Republic of Iran". The current wave of protests, the boldest the regime has ever faced in the 43 years of its existence, was ignited when hijab enforcement patrols arrested Mahsa Amini violently that led to her death at hospital due to severe trauma on her head.
In a meeting with the chairman and some members of the Assembly of Experts in Tehran on Thursday, Khamenei said that the Islamic establishment “opposes those who believe in the Western secularism and opposes the leaders of liberal democracy, who have hatched a plot to dominate over and plunder the world’s resources behind the false flag of freedom and democracy,” he said.
According to a confidential letter obtained by Iran International in recent days, the Revolutionary Guard (IRGC) has asked the government not to disclose the budget of institutions such as the Hijab police, which are criticized by the people.
The regime has heavy-handedly suppressed protesters, executing four young men, killing well over 500, including more than 70 children, and arresting around 20,000 in the past five months.
On Monday, an estimated crowd of about 20 to 30 thousand people held a rally in Brussels outside the European Council to call on EU countries to designate Iran’s Revolutionary Guard as a terrorist organization. Thousands of Iranians from all over Europe held a massive rally in Strasbourg in January for the same purpose. Also on Monday, the EU sanctioned 32 Islamic Republic officials, including culture and education ministers, deputy IRGC commander, and several MPs. The move can be seen as a measure to justify the fact that the EU is not yet ready to designate the entirety of the IRGC.