(Web Desk) - Iran’s anti-government protests are rooted in long-standing restrictions on girls and women, including access to education, said Malala Yousafzai, the education activist and Nobel peace prize laureate.
Yousafzai said on X that the ongoing protests “cannot be separated from the long-standing, state-imposed restrictions on girls’ and women’s autonomy,” and added: “Iranian girls, like girls everywhere, demand a life with dignity.”
The protests in Iran cannot be separated from the long-standing, state-imposed restrictions on girls’ and women’s autonomy, in all aspects of public life including education. Iranian girls, like girls everywhere, demand a life with dignity. The people of Iran have long warned…
— Malala Yousafzai (@Malala) January 12, 2026She said Iranians had warned about repression “at great personal risk” for decades and described a broader system of control shaped by “segregation, surveillance, and punishment.”
Yousafzai said Iranians were demanding the right to determine their political future, adding that it “must be driven by the Iranian people, and include the leadership of Iranian women and girls.”
“I stand with the people and girls of Iran in their call for freedom and dignity,” she wrote.