According to Reuters, US Vice President Kamala Harris said on November 2 that the United States will try to remove Iran from the 45-member UN Commission on the Status of Women (CSW) due to the Iranian government's denial of women's rights and brutal crackdown on protests.

Protests have erupted across Iran ever since the "morality police" killed a 22-year-old Kurdish woman named Mahsa Amini for "improperly" wearing a scarf. Since the riots began, Iranians of all backgrounds have joined the uprising, presenting the most serious challenge to the country's clerical leadership since the 1979 revolution.However, Iran is denying the allegations of human rights abuse, especially against women, and is instead placing blame on its foreign enemies and their agents for the unrest.

Iran's four-year term on the Commission, which holds meetings every March and works to advance gender parity and women's empowerment, just started. According to a statement released by Harris, "the United States believes that no nation that systematically abuses the rights of women and girls should play a role in any international or United Nations body charged with protecting these very same rights."

Iran has said that the US and its allies are using the UN "to further their political agenda" and has asked other countries not to go to the meeting.In the letter to UN member states, Iran's UN Ambassador, Amir Saeid Iravani, said that the US does not care about human rights in Iran or anywhere else.

According to the United Nations, the CSW is instrumental in promoting women's rights, documenting the reality of women's " lives throughout the world, and shaping global standards on gender equality and the empowerment of women."

By: Baniz Wasman