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Sun, May 16, 2011 | The Meir Amit Intelligence and Terrorism Information Center

This women is stopped by the moral police, because she wears the boots over her jeans and both is considered "bad-hijab behaviour" (whatever that means) in Iran.

Iran: Tougher Measures to Enforce the Islamic Dress Code

This week, the morality police chief has announced tougher measures to enforce the Islamic dress code in Iran. Ahmed Rouzbahani said that the implementation of the moral security program, employing 70 thousand policemen, will begin as summer approaches.

He noted that the enforcement program will be more extensive and serious than ever before, saying that the police are determined to use all available means to combat “the Western cultural attack and corruption”. Rouzbahani noted that police presence in public places will be increased in the next several months, and that the police patrols will be renamed from “guidance patrols” to “moral security patrols”. Police presence in parks, forests, near rivers, on the streets, and in other public places will be increased. Citizens arrested in the Islamic dress code enforcement operations will be taken to a police station and released only after family members provide them with appropriate clothing. They will also be required to sign a statement agreeing to refrain from such actions in the future.

Rouzbahani added that, under the program, the police also intend to stop cars driving women without veils. He stressed that the non-enforcement of the Islamic dress code in cars is also considered a crime, and that cars are not considered private places. Police also intend to take measures against dog owners walking their pets in public. The police’s fight against dog owners has been made possible thanks to new laws recently passed by the Majles, which prohibit taking dogs (considered unclean animals in Islam) to public places (Aftab, May 9).

In previous years, internal security forces also stepped up the enforcement of the Islamic dress code at the start of summer. Since the conservatives regained power in 2005, the enforcement has grown considerably stronger after a period of leniency from the mid-1990s. In recent years, however, clerics and conservative elements have repeatedly claimed that the government’s enforcement policy is unsatisfactory, as a result of which women do not observe the practice of wearing veils. Ahmadinejad’s critics in the conservative bloc even accused the president of taking an overly tolerant approach with regard to Islamic dress code enforcement.