AFP: Two thirds of Iranian women have suffered domestic violence and a quarter are unhappy with their gender, a social welfare official said Monday. TEHRAN, Oct 31 (AFP) – Two thirds of Iranian women have suffered domestic violence and a quarter are unhappy with their gender, a social welfare official said Monday.
Sociologist Jaleh Shaditalab of Iran’s National Welfare Organisation said most of the victims were in forced marriages and that abuses also included mental torment, humiliation and being prevented from working.
She said the figures were drawn from a national survey of the problem.
In February 2005 the UN’s top official on women’s rights, Yakin Erturk, chastised Iran over what she said were abuses and discrimination built in to the Islamic republic’s laws.
Iran’s laws “do not provide protection for victims of domestic violence and make it difficult to escape violence through divorce”, she said, adding that suffering wives also faced “time-consuming judicial procedures and stigmatisation”.
