Iran ‘assures’ FIFA women can attend World Cup qualifier
FIFA has been “assured” that Iran will allow women to attend a World Cup qualifier in Tehran next month.
Football’s governing body wants Iran to lift a 40-year ban on women attending matches that violates statutes prohibiting discrimination.
Read more: Maryam Irandoost: Fighting for women’s football in Iran
Pressure on Iran has mounted since a young woman killed herself earlier this month after being arrested trying to enter a stadium.
“We need to have women attending — we need to push for that with respect but in a strong and forceful way, and we cannot wait anymore,” FIFA president Gianni Infantino told a conference on women’s football on Sunday.
“We have been assured that as of the next international game of Iran, women will be allowed to enter football stadiums,” he said.
“This is something very important; it is 40 years that this has not happened, with a couple of exceptions, but it is important to move to the next level and to the next stage,” he added.
Iran faces off against Cambodia on October 10 for a World Cup qualifier, their first home game of the 2022 qualifying competition.
Iran has banned women from attending football matches and other stadiums when men’s teams play since the 1979 Islamic Revolution.
In November, a group of women were allowed to attend an Asian Champions League final in Tehran, where Infantino was present.
Sahar Khodayari, dubbed “blue girl” because of the colors of the team she supported, set herself on fire outside a courthouse early in September out of fear of being imprisoned for six months. She had been detained last year after trying to enter a stadium dressed as a man.
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cw/jlw (AFP, AP, Reuters)
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