The secretary general of the Justice and Development Party (PJD) and former head of the Moroccan government, Abdelilah Benkirane, denounced the arrest of unveiled women in Iran. These actions are a “mounkar (an abomination), he claimed.
During a press conference, the leader of the PJD, an Islamist-inspired party, returned to the events in Iran, where demonstrations are taking place in solidarity with the young Mahsa Amini, beaten to death by the morality police for having showing her hair too much in public.
Abdelilah Benkirane called on this occasion, scholars and ulama of Islam to denounce the restrictions of freedoms and restrictions on clothing imposed on women in Iran.
The politician said he expects from scholars, thinkers and opinion leaders in Muslim countries, and from Islamic-inspired movements around the world, unequivocal condemnations of these extreme behaviors which have nothing to do with Islam.
Benkirane also drew a parallel with the situation in Afghanistan since the return of the Taliban, who now impose the full veil on women.
“We must denounce the excesses that appear among the Islamists. Because we will not progress if we remain silent on the deviations that appear between us,” he said.
He recalled in this regard that Islam does not impose any sanction on unveiled women and does not order their arrest as the Iranian regime does.
The former head of government said that when he was in charge of the executive, as the first head of government from an Islamist-inspired party, he never paid attention to the clothing choices of women, considering that he had to manage the real problems of the citizens.
And to continue, while completely dissociating itself from the Iranian regime, that the PJD is different from the rest of the Islamic factions, in the sense that throughout its presence within, and at the very head of the government, it dealt with real problems of the State and of the citizens.