Iran's Ali Khamenei Says Men Should Tell Their Wives 'I Love You', Advocates Hijab For Women

Iran's Ayatollah Sayyed Ali Khamenei met with hundreds of women and girls from across the country at Imam Khomeini Hussainiya in Tehran on December 3. The meeting comes days before the Mother's Day celebration on December 10 in the country. In the meeting, the leader emphasised women's independence, rights and dignity. 

In a video that surfaced on social media, Ali Khamenei said, “Women, men are complementary partners in building civilisation, sharing equal dignity, unity." In the same speech, he also warned against adopting ‘Western cultural narratives’. As per a local media publication he shared, “In Islam, women possess independence, capability, identity, and opportunities for progress, while the capitalist outlook reduces women to subordination, strips them of dignity.” 

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He stressed that Western capitalism labels corruption as ‘freedom’. The leader shared, “In Islam, women possess independence, capability, identity, and opportunities for progress, while the capitalist outlook reduces women to subordination, strips them of dignity. The destruction of the family structure and the spread of sexual permissiveness under the guise of freedom as major sins of capitalist culture over the past two centuries." 

He also stressed that women have a right to affection in their households. Khamenei shared, “Men should tell their wives, I love you’. The most important right a woman of the household has is affection."

The speech by Ayatollah Sayyed Ali Khamenei comes amid reports of Iran severely lacking in women's right as compared to developed nations.