The state security forces on Wednesday, May 22, 2019, raided a restaurant in a university in the northeastern city of Mashhad that was serving food during the Ramadan fast.
A video circulated on social media showed college students fleeing from rooftops as state authorities raiding the restaurant to arrest anyone eating during fasting hours.
Iranian morality police and Basijis typically step up public patrols during Ramadan, to ensure that people do not violate prohibitions on eating in daylights hours.
There are other videos published on social media during the past few days, showing the state security forces arresting people for eating during fasting hours.
Elsewhere, Basij militia and pro-government plainclothes vigilante groups on May 13, attacked Tehran University students staging a peaceful protest against heightened enforcement of religious restrictions during the month of Ramadan.
Iran’s judiciary and security forces regularly launch draconian restrictions on behavior considered un-Islamic in the month of Ramadan.
Men in Iran have been ordered not to look at women during Ramadan as part of a crackdown on freedoms by the regime.
The country’s judiciary announced that anyone eating in public during the fasting period or playing music on their car radio would also be arrested.
“My personal advice to women is to respect the hijab even more than before and gentlemen must avoid looking directly at female passersby,” Gholam Hossein Esmaili, a judiciary spokesperson said.
“Anyone ignoring these instructions during the Ramadan will be committing an offence and should expect some punishment from the law enforcement units.”
