the Guardian

Victims of Iran’s 2022 crackdown file criminal complaint against 40 officials

Claim filed in Argentina alleges crimes against humanity were carried out on Women, Life, Freedom protesters

Shahinkar, 38 at the time she was attacked on 18 October, only realised what had happened when she felt something warm on her face. Protesters warned her not to get into an ambulance since she might be taken to a police station. When Shahinkar finally arrived at a medical clinic, a staff member told her to leave because they would not treat protesters. But a doctor examined her and sent her to a hospital, where Shahinkar pretended a rock accidentally injured her eye so that she would not be denied treatment. She posted her injuries on her Instagram page, and in January 2023 plainclothes officers approached her, leading her to flee Iran. She collected the 2023 Sakharov prize, which honours individuals or groups who defend human rights and basic freedoms, as a representative of the Women, Life, Freedom movement. The group seeking the criminal investigation say the filing is not viewed just as a legal complaint with no hope of a practical outcome. Universal jurisdiction allows complaints to be investigated in a third country even if the offence did not occur in that country and the offender is not there. Argentina has some of the most liberal rules on universal jurisdiction claims in the world. In 2014 alone the principle of universal jurisdiction led to 27 convictions, the opening of least 36 cases, covering crimes committed in 32 countries. Cases are currently being prosecuted in 16 different countries. As the request is solely for a criminal investigation, and this is not a civil lawsuit, there is no demand by the complainants for money damages. The complaint would not be the first case against Iranian officials brought in Argentina. In June 2025, an Argentinian judge ordered that in absentia trials begin against seven Iranian suspects, along with three Lebanese individuals, for the 1994 bombing of a Jewish community centre in Buenos Aires in which 85 people were killed and hundreds wounded.

dw.com

Iran curbs women's rights further by changing dowry law – DW – 12/17/2025

Iranian lawmakers have pushed through changes to the dowry law, further weakening women's rights and aggravating gender discrimination in the Islam...

Iranian lawmakers have pushed through changes to the dowry law, further weakening women's rights and aggravating gender discrimination in the Islamic Republic. The Iranian parliament has adopted changes to the dowry law, with members of parliament describing them as "urgently necessary." The proposal's swift passage stands in stark contrast to other legislative measures, such as the draft bill for better protection of women against domestic violence, which has been under discussion for 14 years. In Iran, a groom or his family usually pays a dowry, or "Mehrieh," to his wife. It often takes the form of gold coins, but it can also include cash, property and other items. The dowry, which is negotiated before marriage and legally treated as debt, can be claimed by the wife at any time during a marriage or when getting divorced. The new, more lenient policy sharply lowers the threshold for the amount a man must pay his wife in the event of divorce to avoid imprisonment — from 110 gold coins to just 14 coins. Each coin is about 8 grams of gold. The dowry, which is voluntarily agreed upon before marriage, remains the only legal tool to provide a modicum of financial security for women in Iran, in the event of divorce and in inheritance law. In the event of divorce, unlike in the West, Iranian law does not provide for the division of property. If the husband dies, the wife receives only one-eighth of his movable property. Real estate, such as houses or land, goes to the children or, if there are none, to the parents of the deceased. If there are neither children nor parents, the wife receives one-quarter of the property, with the remainder taken over by the state. "We are dealing with a system that is deeply misogynistic in its ideology," women's rights activist Mahdieh Golrou told DW.

MSN

Senior officials who oversaw a flawed benefits system that plunged hundreds of thousands of carers into debt are under mounting pressure over their “misleading” response to the scandal. Prof Liz Sayce, the chair of a scathing review into the government’s treatment of unpaid carers, last week called for an overhaul of management and culture at the Department for Work and Pensions (DWP). Days after the publication of the review, the DWP’s top civil servant in charge of carers’ allowance, Neil Couling, said carers themselves were at fault for the decade-long failures. His comments, revealed by the Guardian, have prompted a key adviser to the Sayce review and a leading carer’s charity to declare a lack of confidence in the department’s pledge to fix the issues. Prof Sue Yeandle, the UK’s leading expert on unpaid carers, said ministers and senior officials had issued “really misleading” claims that the failures affected only a small number of people. Helen Walker, the chief executive of Carers UK, said: “This is not a small number of people. Its scale and the devastation caused to so many families cannot be over-estimated, as was laid bare in Liz Sayce’s report. Any suggestion that this is anything other than a systemic failure over a number of years is unacceptable.”

JK Rowling condemns Labour for blocking new trans guidance protecting women's rights to female-only safe spaces | Daily Mail Online

JK Rowling hit out at the Government for claiming it wants to

JK Rowling has blasted Labour for blocking new transgender guidance which protects women's rights to female-only spaces. The Harry Potter author hit out at the Government for claiming it wants to 'stamp out misogyny' after Bridget Phillipson blocked the publication of new Equality and Human Rights Commission (EHRC) guidance on women-only spaces. The Labour Women and Equalities Secretary branded the proposals 'trans-exclusive', arguing it would unfairly discriminate transgender women. Ms Phillipson has refused to sign off the draft guidance more than three months after receiving it, despite a landmark Supreme Court ruling that sex under equality law means biological sex. She claimed the guidance could prevent women from taking their infant sons into swimming pool changing rooms and said there were 'many entirely plausible exceptions' to single-sex rules. The Labour minister also argued that the Supreme Court ruling was primarily concerned with maternity protections rather than blanket restrictions on access to women-only spaces. JK Rowling attacked Labour for claiming it was rooting out misogyny while 'fighting to remove women's and girls' rights to single-sex spaces'. In a post on X, the author said: 'This government tells us in one breath that it wants to stamp out misogyny, and in the next that it will be fighting in the Supreme Court to remove women's and girls' rights to single-sex spaces.'

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Sandie Peggie has told how friends turned against her during her legal battle with the NHS over single-sex changing rooms. The nurse said she “lost people I thought were friends” after they spoke against her at a tribunal she brought against NHS Fife for suspending her. She had complained about sharing a female-only changing room with a transgender doctor at the hospital where she worked in Kirkcaldy. “I’ve learned a lot and who is there for you and who is not. Who my friends are. I suppose I just don’t trust people as much as I did.” Ms Peggie said she was shocked to see colleagues and her line manager speak out against her during proceedings. “I watched them all giving evidence and just thought, what is going on here?” Ms Peggie also told how one friend “sent an awful message during the tribunal because her name was mentioned”, adding: “But that’s not my fault. I was under oath in the witness box.” https://archive.ph/0R9fh