Iran's controversial 'morality police' disbanded after months of anti-hijab unrest

Iran has abolished its morality police, local media reported on Sunday, following more than two months of protests that were sparked by Mahsa Amini's detention for allegedly breaching the nation's stringent female dress code.

Since the 22-year-old Iranian of Kurdish descent passed away in detention on September 16, three days after her arrest by the morality police in Tehran, protests spearheaded by women that the authorities have dubbed "riots" have engulfed the country.

Since Amini's death, an increasing number of women have refused to wear the hijab, especially in parts of Tehran, while demonstrators have torched their required head coverings and blasted anti-government chants.

Attorney General Mohammad Jafar Montazeri was cited by the ISNA news agency as stating, "Morality police have nothing to do with the judiciary and have been abolished". According to the report, he made his remark in response to a participant's question about "why the morality police were being shut down" during a religious conference.

There has been some sort of government monitoring of the stringent clothing code for both men and women since the 1979 Islamic Revolution that toppled Iran's monarchy with US backing.

However, under the hardline president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, the Gasht-e Ershad or "Guidance Patrol" — a morality police force — was established to "spread the culture of modesty and hijab".

They initiated their patrols in 2006 to enact the dress code, which outlaws shorts, torn jeans, and other items of clothing deemed immodest and also mandates that women wear long garments.

Furthermore, President Ebrahim Raisi, who also serves as the head of Iran's Supreme Council of the Cultural Revolution, in a televised interview on Saturday said that Iran's republican and Islamic foundations were constitutionally entrenched "but there are methods of implementing the constitution that can be flexible".

Since demonstrations began on September 16 in response to Amini's demise, more than 300 people have been killed across Iran, according to a Revolutionary Guards general.

On Tuesday, Oslo-based non-governmental organisation Iran Human Rights, said that security forces had "killed at least 448 people in the ongoing nationwide protests."

Thousands of people have been arrested, including prominent Iranian actors and footballers.