TEHRAN: Police in Iran said on Saturday they plan to use “smart” technology in public places to identify and then punish women who violate the country’s strict Islamic dress code.
A statement said the force would “use tools and smart cameras in public places and streets to identify people breaking the norm”.
The police will then send “evidence and warning messages to violators of the hijab law” to “inform them of the legal consequences of repeating the offence”.
The number of women violating Iran’s mandatory dress code has increased since a wave of protests following the death in custody of Mehsa Amini, a 22-year-old Kurdish Iranian, for allegedly violating the law.
“From next week, those who remove the niqab will be identified by smart devices,” Iran’s police chief Ahmad Reza Radan said in an interview on state television.
“Those who remove their hijab in public places will be warned first and will be brought before the courts as the next step,” Radan said.
Car owners will also receive a warning text if any of their passengers violate the dress code, and their vehicles will be impounded for repeat offences, he said.
Amini Moralty died on September 16, three days after being arrested by police.
After his death, there was a wave of civil protests in the Islamic Republic.
In a separate statement on Saturday, the police said they will not tolerate “any individual or collective behavior and actions that are against the law.”
In a video that went viral on social media last week, a man was shown throwing yogurt at two women for not wearing hijab.
In late March, Judiciary Chief Ghulam Hussain Mohseni Agee said that “removing the hijab is tantamount to hostility to values and those who commit such extraordinary acts will be punished”.
Shortly after the 1979 Islamic Revolution, the requirement for women to wear headscarves in public was added to the law.
