Iranian sport climber Elnaz Rekabi returns to Tehran after competing without wearing required hijab
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ELNAZ REKABI: “When I saw the picture and read the description of the conditions and the amount of time I would be staying alone in Iran, I came back to Iran with a smile on my face and with a renewed hope that we can change our situation from a negative to a positive.” (Photo by Elnaz Rekabi)
A young Iranian woman breaks the glass to her head to escape a life of forced hijab, a requirement in Iran.
A woman without a traditional hijab has been wearing a small, white frame on a black t-shirt, for at least four days while climbing through Iran.
“This is a small, symbolic act of resistance to the oppression of women in Iran,” Elnaz Rekabi, a sport climber who has been climbing without a hijab in the mountains of Iran since she was 25, said at the time of publication. “My reason for doing this is to support the women of Iran.”
The young woman, who is in her 20s and is not identified, had climbed for over four days in the mountains of the Kermanshah province. At that time, she did not have a traditional hijab. She had come to Iran seeking to climb, like countless others before her.
After the video of her climbing went viral, she was contacted by an Iranian government official who had just flown into Tehran from a trip to the United States.
At that time, the young woman did not wear a hijab, but she was asked to remove her own head cover in order to fly.
“We are not aware of the severity of the situation in Iran, but we wanted to make sure she could get home safely,” said Y.J. Mirkarimi, media adviser for Iran’s culture minister. “We did ask her to remove her head cover to ensure she could fly.”
“No one in Iran has a right to be religious