On a darkened road beside the Caspian Sea, Iranian police officers opened fire last month on a 31-year-old woman who had tried to speed away likely knowing they wanted to seize her vehicle.

Police had been ordered to impound her car, activists say, because of an earlier violation of Irans headscarf law for showing her hair in public while driving.

Now unable to walk and confined to a bed at a police hospital, Arezou Badri “ a mother of two “ is the latest casualty of Irans renewed crackdown over headscarves, or hijabs. Her shooting occurred nearly two years after 22-year-old Mahsa Amini died while in police custody over an alleged headscarf violation, sparking nationwide protests over womens rights and against the countrys theocracy.

As the Sept. 16 anniversary of Aminis death approaches, Irans new reformist President Masoud Pezeshkian has promised to ease enforcement of the headscarf law. But the murky details of Badris shooting and a recent video of a girl being manhandled in the streets of Tehran show the dangers still lurking for those willing to disobey it.

They have elevated it to the most serious crime, where the police is allowed basically to shoot to kill, said Hadi Ghaemi, executive director of the New York-based Center for Human Rights in Iran. Thats really a war on women. (AP)