Internationally acclaimed Iranian human rights attorney and women’s rights advocate Nasrin Sotoudeh has been arrested by the Iranian regime. Her whereabouts are currently unknown. Our hearts are with Sotoudeh and her family, including her husband Reza Khandan, who has been detained in Tehran’s notorious Evin Prison since December 2024 for supporting her work for women’s equality.
Meanwhile in Baghdad, an American freelance journalist has been kidnapped. Shelly Kittleson, who had built her freelance career reporting from the Middle East for years, is known among colleagues for her determined, on-the-ground reporting and willingness to go where others would not. On Tuesday, she was taken by two unknown men, after learning of threats to her safety from militias.
Time and time again, it is women who speak out in the face of state repression—whether they are doing so as journalists speaking truth to power, lawyers fighting for the rights of the oppressed, or everyday women taking to the streets in defiance of regimes that seek to strip them of their autonomy and human rights.
The post In Iran, Iraq and the U.S., Women Speak Out Against State Repression appeared first on Ms. Magazine.
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