Iranian woman jailed for lack of hijab was freed, lawyer says

TEHRAN, Iran — A woman arrested for posing without a headscarf in public in defiance of Iran’s Islamic dress code has been released after nearly one month in detention, a lawyer says Monday.

Nasrin Sotoudeh, a renowned human rights lawyer, tells AFP she saw the woman’s file at the prosecutor’s office and was told by a judicial official that she had been “freed.”

The woman has not been seen in public since she stood on a pillar box at one of Tehran’s busiest thoroughfares without the headscarf or long coat required under Islamic law.

Images posted on social media showed her waving a white scarf on a stick — an apparent reference to so-called “White Wednesday” protests against mandatory clothing rules for women.

— AFP