Yasaman Aryani

Yasaman Aryani is an Iranian human rights activist.

In August 2018, she was arrested at a protest in Tehran with other activists, while assisting an old woman the police knocked to the ground. Charged with "disrupting public order", Yasaman was sentenced to a year in Evin Prison. According to the U.S., Evin Prison has committed "serious human rights abuses" against political dissidents and critics of the government.

When released in February 2019, Yasaman denounced her early release as "a show" with the Iranian government trying to promote an image with the international community.

On 8 March 2019, she and her mother boarded a women-only train on the Tehran Metro, and neither of them wore headscarves.In April 2019, Yasaman and her mother were arrested in relation to the video (right) taken of them on a train without headscarves.In the video, Yasaman spoke of her hopes for a future when women would be free to choose what they wear, "me without the hijab and you with the hijab".After a version of the video went viral, Yasaman was arrested and charged with "inciting and facilitating corruption and prostitution" through promoting "unveiling". Yasaman and her mother were each sentenced to 16 years in prison.

According to the Nobel Women's Initiative, Yasaman has faced "nightmarish conditions in prison... she’s been held in solitary confinement, denied calls from family, and threatened with the arrest of other family members if she did not recant on camera and express 'regret' for allowing herself to be influenced by 'foreign agents'." Amnesty International campaigns for her release.