The principal and vice principal of the school threatened to expel Arezoo Khavari, an Afghan living in Iran, for not wearing the required hijab. Khavari then committed himself. Arezoo Khavari, a 16-year-old student at Kowsar High School in District 20 of Shahr’eh Ray, reportedly committed suicide on Saturday, November 4, 2024, after being threatened with expulsion by Mahnaz Ghanbarian, the school principal.According to sources, when Arezoo Khavari’s headscarf unintentionally slipped during a field trip, the vice principal captured her dancing on camera. After receiving the footage, the principal called Arezo into the office and threatened to have her expelled from the school.The vice principle allegedly ridiculed Arezoo for wearing jeans when several of her classmates wore identical attire, and she was threatened with expulsion on the same day as the school excursion.Arezoo departed the school premises after receiving these threats. She went into a nearby open building, ascended to the sixth storey, leaped to the ground, and committed suicide.
In the past, school officials had humiliated Arezoo. She was frequently chastised by the vice principal for her attire, citing Iranian regulations and saying that Afghans such as herself “should be sent to the Taliban as concubines.”Arezoo’s father acknowledged in an interview with Rokna that his daughter had left on a school excursion on Saturday. “Do you know what your daughter has done?” the school called him. Instead of wearing the school uniform, she chose to wear jeans. “The school called back half an hour later to report that Arezoo had left the school grounds without permission at 4 p.m. and they had no further information on her whereabouts,” he continued.”An hour later, the school called us again, urging us to rush to the hospital,” he continued. I drive a pickup truck and work in scrap metal. I dropped everything and hurried to the hospital as soon as I received the news, only to discover my daughter dead. She was dead. Since then, Arezoo’s father has complained to the Shahr-e Rey police about Kowsar High School administrators.
The majority of Afghan migrants in Iran do not have access to basic civil rights, making their situation “dreadful.” The group issues a warning about the Islamic Republic of Iran’s increasingly severe measures for Afghan migrants.In addition, the denial of women’s and young girls’ basic human rights has created a climate in which killing them and coercing them into suicide have become frighteningly routine. In the Islamic Republic of Iran’s gender-apartheid system, systematic brutality against young women is exemplified by the tragic murder of 16-year-old Arezoo Khavari, who was threatened with expulsion for dancing. Arezoo’s misery was exacerbated by the additional worry that she would not be able to receive an education because of her Afghan ancestry, which finally caused her to take her own life.
