{"id":20742,"date":"2019-10-09T14:13:00","date_gmt":"2019-10-09T22:13:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/associatednews.info\/content\/thousands-of-women-will-at-last-be-allowed-to-attend-a-soccer-match-in-iran\/"},"modified":"2019-10-09T14:13:00","modified_gmt":"2019-10-09T22:13:00","slug":"thousands-of-women-will-at-last-be-allowed-to-attend-a-soccer-match-in-iran","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/associatednews.info\/content\/thousands-of-women-will-at-last-be-allowed-to-attend-a-soccer-match-in-iran\/","title":{"rendered":"Thousands Of Women Will At Last Be Allowed To Attend A Soccer Match In Iran"},"content":{"rendered":"

By Laurel Wamsley<\/a><\/span> <\/p>\n

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\n Iranian sports journalist Raha Purbakhsh shows off her ticket to attend a World Cup qualifier in front of Azadi Stadium in Tehran on Tuesday. Iran has essentially banned women from entering the stadium for decades.<\/p>\n

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Atta Kenare\/AFP via Getty Images<\/p>\n

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Atta Kenare\/AFP via Getty Images<\/p>\n

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For some 40 years, women have been largely banned from attending soccer matches at Iran’s stadiums. But under pressure from FIFA, soccer’s governing body, Iranian authorities are allowing a few thousand women to watch a game Thursday at Tehran’s Azadi Stadium \u2013 in a section separate from men.<\/p>\n

Women were permitted to buy about 3,500 tickets<\/a> to watch a World Cup qualifier<\/a> between the men’s teams of Iran and Cambodia.<\/p>\n

The change comes after an Iranian woman set herself on fire and died<\/a> last month, as she faced charges arising from her trying to enter the stadium to watch a match. The woman, 29-year-old soccer fan Sahar Khodayari, had dressed up as a man to try to get into the game. When security guards discerned that she was a woman, she was expelled and charged<\/a> with “appearing in public without a hijab.”<\/p>\n

The ban has been in place since 1979’s Islamic revolution, with only small groups of women<\/a> allowed to attend a handful of matches in recent years.<\/p>\n

Iranian sports journalist Raha Purbakhsh is among those who got a ticket to Thursday’s match. She told news service AFP<\/a> that she last stepped into Azadi stadium about 25 years ago with her father.<\/p>\n