Daily Telegraph: Iranian police have launched a crackdown on irreverent social behaviour, seizing foreign-made cars whose drivers were deemed to be harassing women, the state news agency said.
The Daily Telegraph
Iranian police have launched a crackdown on irreverent social behaviour, seizing foreign-made cars whose drivers were deemed to be harassing women, the state news agency said.
“Tehran police have seized 20 foreign-made, high-end cars [whose drivers] harassed women in the north and north-west of the capital,” IRNA reported, without explaining what amounted to harassment.
Another 40 cars were confiscated in eastern Tehran on Saturday as part of the crackdown, which authorities said was aimed at boosting security.
IRNA reported that the seized cars were put on display on Monday in Tehran’s uptown Andarzgoo Boulevard, a popular cruising route for urban youths in the evenings.
Pictures carried by Borna news agency, an IRNA offshoot, showed cars parked along a Tehran street with placards on their tops that said: “Combating harassment of women.”
Drivers, including women, appeared to be haggling with police.
“They caught me with my girlfriend in the car. They seized the car and my drivers’ licence,” a young man who asked not to be named told AFP.
“Yes, the music was a bit too loud, but that’s all,” said the man, whose Peugeot 206 was taken away on Saturday.
Summer-time crackdowns on what the authorities perceive as un-Islamic behaviour and attire are common in Iran.
Youths, especially women, have faced tougher moral policing under President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad’s rule since 2005.
Thousands of women were arrested and warned about wearing figure-hugging short coats and flimsy headscarves in the streets of cities in defiance of the law which requires modest dressing.
The police also targeted young men sporting tight, low-slung jeans and flamboyant modern hairdos.
