Author: Nasrin Bassiri

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Women artists working in the Iranian film industry (source: Iran Journal)

Sexual violence

#MeToo revelations rock Iranian film industry

More than 800 Iranian filmmakers have signed a declaration against sexual harassment, coercion and violence in their industry. The public's response to their willingness to name and shame has been overwhelming. By Nasrin BassiriMore

″Love, sex, death and the search for truth in Tehran″: Where nothing is allowed, yet anything is possibleWinner of the Berlinale 2020: "Sheytan Vojud Nadarad": There is no evil, unless it's perpetratedQantara dossier: Iranian cinema
Russian President Vladimir Putin meets Ayatollah Ali Khamenei in Tehran, November 2015 (source: YouTube screenshot)

War in Ukraine

Iran's conflict of interests

On the one hand, the Islamic rulers of Iran are sitting around the same table with the West to solve the nuclear conflict. On the other, their political ally Russia is at war with a European country – in direct contravention of United Nations articles. By Nasrin BassiriMore

E3, Russia and China: Solving the nuclear deal stalemate with IranRussia's interventions in Ukraine and Syria: What drives Putin is evident from SyriaIran nuclear talks enter ‘final stage’: Iran's Vienna gambitIranʹs dilemma: Securing a slice of post-war Syria
Sex worker on the street in Tehran, Iran (photo: Mehr)

Prostitution in the Islamic Republic of Iran

Open-minded, loving... and desperate

How did the Islamic revolutionaries deal with prostitution and sex workers in Iran, and how does the business of sex work in Iran today? Have supply and demand changed four decades after the ayatollahs came to power? By Nasrin BassiriMore

Prostitution in the Shah's Iran: Shahr-e No – "the neighbourhood of the sorrowful" The documentary film ''In the Bazaar of Sexes'': Temporary marriage in IranChild trafficking in Iran: The agony of the destitute
Still of an alley in the prostitutes' ghetto Shahr-e No in Tehran before 1980 (source: ROUYDAD24.IR)

Prostitution in the Shah's Iran

Shahr-e No – "the neighbourhood of the sorrowful"

Drawing on the history of Tehran's Shahr-e No red light district, Nasrin Bassiri describes how prostitution functioned in Iran before the Islamic Revolution. The neighbourhood would end up being destroyed in August 1980, six months after Khomeini came to powerMore

Child trafficking in Iran: The agony of the destituteThe documentary film ''In the bazaar of sexes'': Temporary marriage in Iran″City of lies. Love, sex, death and the search for truth in Tehran″: Where nothing is allowed, yet anything is possibleThe photography of Kaveh Golestan
Iranian author Amir Hassan Cheheltan (photo: Wolfgang Kumm/dpa)

Interview with Iranian author Amir Hassan Cheheltan

"Literature is based on politics and eroticism"

Amir Hassan Cheheltan has not published a novel in Iran in 15 years. The 62-year-old author does intend to refrain from writing either about politics or eroticism, as censorship in Iran prescribes. In Europe, meanwhile, his works are enjoying increasing popularity. Eight books by Cheheltan have already been published in German. Interview by Nasrin BassiriMore

Book review: Amir Hassan Cheheltanʹs "Der standhafte Papagei": History of a revolutionPortrait Amir Hassan Cheheltan: A love-hate relationship with TehranIran and its authors: The perils of writing
Veiled Iranian women at Babolsar on the Caspian Sea (photo: picture-alliance/dpa/M. UPI/Maryam Rahmanian)

Women's rights in Iran

Farewell compulsory veiling? Time to go with the flow

After the Iranian Revolution in 1979, the Islamic regime began to force women to adopt Islamic dress. Resistance to the rule has never ceased, though it has changed. And suddenly compulsory veiling in the theocracy no longer seems to be on solid ground. An abridged version of the original article by Nasrin BassiriMore

Official My Stealthy Freedom websiteScience in Iran: Headscarves and nanotechNepotism in Iran's Islamic Republic: At home with the mullahsThe influence of Iran′s religious foundations: Faith and profit enshrined