**Iranian Student Arrested After Solo Protest Against Harassment**

An Iranian female student was detained on Saturday after stripping to her underwear in protest against harassment at Tehran Azad University of Science and Research. The student's dramatic protest followed an incident where members of the Basij militia reportedly tore off her headscarf and clothes inside the university, as per various news outlets and social media sources outside Iran.

Following the altercation, the woman moved outside the university gates and removed her remaining clothes, sitting in her underwear in public view before boldly walking down the street. This act of defiance was captured on videos shared on social media, surprising many passers-by. In Iran, women are legally required to wear a headscarf and loose-fitting clothing that conceals their body shape when in public.

The footage initially surfaced on the Amir Kabir newsletter, an Iranian student social media channel, and was subsequently picked up by several Persian-language media outlets, including the Dadban legal affairs channel, Hengaw rights group, and Iran Wire news website. The videos appear to have been recorded by bystanders from a nearby building. Another clip depicted the woman being forcefully taken into a car by men in plain clothes and driven to an unknown location. The Amir Kabir newsletter claimed that she was beaten during the arrest.

While it is difficult to independently verify these reports, Iran's conservative Fars news agency did acknowledge the incident. The agency published an image of the student, though heavily censored, and claimed that she had initially worn "inappropriate clothes" in class and only disrobed after being cautioned by security staff to adhere to the dress code. The report from Fars, citing "witnesses," contended that the guards dealt with the student calmly and denied any aggressive behavior.

This incident comes in the wake of significant women-led protests in 2022, which erupted after the death in custody of Mahsa Amini, an Iranian Kurdish woman arrested for allegedly violating dress codes. Those protests saw women defying norms by removing or even burning their headscarves, but they eventually diminished under the weight of a government crackdown that resulted in 551 deaths and thousands of arrests among the demonstrators.