Iranian women's right activist condemns Western feminists

A women's rights activist in Iran has said it is 'insulting' for Western visitors to wear the hijab in an attempt at solidarity. 

Masih Alinejad, who has spearheaded Iranian women's struggle against the head covering, said female dignitaries from Europe had left her fellow campaigners 'on their own' by choosing to wear the hijab when they visited Iran. 

Rejecting the argument that visitors should wear the hijab out of 'respect for the culture of Iran', she said they were 'sending a message that men are more equal than women'. 

Ms Alinejad, the founder of the White Wednesdays movement which saw many women remove their headscarves in protest, said she was battling against a 'discriminatory law'. 

She said: 'Iranian women, they fight against the compulsory hijab and they are alone, they are on their own.  

'There were three female politicians from the Netherlands - they went to Iran the same day when one of the women of the White Wednesdays movement put her headscarf on a stick and waved it in public, she got arrested.

'The same day there were three female politicians from the Netherlands in Iran obeying compulsory hijab law without challenging it.

'The female politicians from Sweden - they were very well-known when they started to publish a picture to mock President Trump's Cabinet.

'I was like, I love this picture, it's a good way to criticise a male-dominated Cabinet.

'But what happened, the same feminists went to Iran. The same ministers in Iran, they obeyed compulsory hijab laws in front of the President.

'I said to myself, when it comes to America, they are trying to say men and women are equal. But when it comes to [Iran] they are trying to send another message, that men are more equal than women.