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NY Times, Sept. 11, 2019
Iran’s ‘Blue Girl’ Wanted to Watch a Soccer Match. She Died Pursuing Her
Dream.
By Farnaz Fassihi
Her dream was to watch a soccer match from a stadium in Iran, where
women are barred from attending most sports events.
So Sahar Khodayari, 29, sneaked into Azadi Stadium, Tehran’s main
sporting venue. But she was arrested.
Sentenced to six months in prison, she set herself on fire in front of
the courthouse on Sept. 2. She died in a Tehran hospital this week from
severe burns covering 90 percent of her body.
Her death has sparked an outcry from Iranian and international soccer
players.
Many Iranians, including a former captain of the national team, are
calling for a boycott of soccer games until the ban on women attending
matches is lifted. Several officials expressed shock and outrage at what
had happened to Ms. Khodayari.
“Some issues can be resolved simply but we turn them into deep social
scars for which we have no answer to history,” said Fareed Mousavi, a
lawmaker on the Parliament’s youth committee. “We need to rectify these
unjust discriminations before it’s too late.”
The game Ms. Khodayari had wanted to see took place in March between her
favorite team, Esteghlal, against a team from the United Arab Emirates.
Blue is the color of the Esteghlal team, and as news spread that one of
its female fans had set herself on fire, Ms. Khodayari became known on
social media as the “Blue Girl,” with a hashtag, #BlueGirl, bringing
attention to the ban.
Masoumeh Ebtekar, President Hassan Rouhani’s vice president for women
and family affairs — the highest ranking woman in the Iranian government
— issued a statement expressing “deep regret and sadness” for Ms.
Khodayari’s death.
She said her office had appointed a representative to follow the case
since news of the burning surfaced, and said the representative had met
with the mother and sister of the victim in the hospital.
Ms. Ebtekar said a written report on the case had been submitted to the
judiciary on Saturday, and the topic of allowing women in stadiums was
discussed in a cabinet meeting on Sunday.
The news of Ms. Khodayari’s death spread on Monday, but some Persian
news media outlets reported that she had died a few days earlier and was
secretly buried without her family’s knowledge. Iran has a long practice
of denying the family members of deceased people deemed a “security
threat” access to their bodies and conducting secret burials to avoid
publicity.
Iranian activists say Ms. Khodayari’s family has been threatened and
pressured not to speak to the news media.
Iran barred women from entering soccer stadiums after the 1979 Islamic
revolution, when religious laws were enforced to segregate men and women
in public spaces like schools, buses and sports events. For more than a
decade, Iranian rights activists, feminists and die-hard soccer fans
have waged a battle to regain the right for women to attend games.
By 2005, activists gathered weekly outside the Azadi stadium carrying
signs that read “let the other half of the society in.” A small group
dressed in male clothes, sporting fake facial hair and cutting their
hair and hiding it under caps, and sneaking into the stadium.
Their activism gradually gained the attention of international rights
groups and the Iranian public. It was also the subject of a 2006 movie,
“Offside,” by the famed Iranian director Jaffar Panahai.
(Watch "Offside" here for $3.99:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R5V9fpCbVWM)
By 2013, women had organized more formally, creating the group Open
Stadium, and were lobbying with FIFA, international soccer’s governing
body; local soccer teams; and international human rights organizations
to pressure Iran’s government.
FIFA has warned to Iran to lift the ban on women attending international
soccer matches by Oct. 10, when the country’s national team — among the
top in Asia — is to host a World Cup qualifying game.
In some cases, to relieve pressure from FIFA, Iran has selectively
allowed limited number of women, mostly relatives of players or
government officials, to attend certain soccer games. But women are not
allowed to buy tickets for the events.
“They are basically trying to manipulate FIFA,” said Omid Memarian,
deputy director of the Center for Human Rights in Iran, a New York-based
advocacy group. “Even though FIFA has been notified of Iran’s repeated
violations and manipulation tactics to allow women in, still Iran has
gotten away with this discrimination.”
After Ms. Khodayari’s death, FIFA said in a statement, “We are aware of
that tragedy and deeply regret it.”
In the statement, the group said it had repeated its “calls on the
Iranian authorities to ensure the freedom and safety of any women
engaged in this legitimate fight to end the stadium ban for women in Iran.”
Iran officials have said in the past that structural changes in the
arena were needed for women to attend, including the creation of a
special section for them.
FIFA told the Iranian federation that it would send a delegation this
month to ensure that the changes were made in time for the Oct. 10 game,
according to an official familiar with the discussions, who asked to
remain anonymous because the matter is sensitive in Iran.
Still, many Iranians and human rights activists on Tuesday blamed FIFA
for not taking a stronger stand against the ban. International soccer
stars said in Twitter posts that FIFA should step up and enforce its
regulations banning member countries from discriminating on the basis of
gender and race.
Maryam Shojaei, the sister of Iran’s national team captain, Masoud
Soleimani Shojaei, has been among the female leaders campaigning for
women to be allowed to attend games.
In a telephone interview on Tuesday, Ms. Shojaei said that “FIFA was to
blame” for what happened because it had allowed the Iranian authorities
to escape sanction despite activists’ pleas for intervention, including
barring Iran from international soccer games until it lifted the ban.
Magdalena Eriksson, a soccer player for Chelsea F.C. Women, a British
soccer team, wrote on Twitter: “FIFA or any other organization that’s in
a position of privilege and power, you need to act to make this stop!”
Iranian soccer teams and players have shown solidarity and outrage at
Ms. Khodayari’s death.
“There will come a day in the future when one of Tehran’s largest
stadium will be named ‘Sahar,’ ” said the former captain of the national
soccer team, Andranik Teymourian.
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