A/HRC/40/24 between the ages of 15 and 29 years were unemployed. 146 ILO also expressed its concerns in relation to persisting legal restrictions on women’s access to employment.147 61. The Secretary-General remains concerned that the legal age for marriage under the Civil Code is 13 years for girls and 15 years for boys. Parliament agreed on 26 September 2018 to urgently consider a plan to amend article 1041 of the Civil Code 148 to raise the legal age for marriage to 16 years for girls and 18 years for boys. However, girls could still be married as young as 13 with a court’s permission. According to reports by the National Organization for Civil Registration, the marriage of 1,463 girls under the age of 15 was registered during the last Persian year (March 2017–March 2018). 62. The Secretary-General is concerned by the ongoing repression of women in relation to their objection to compulsory veiling and by the response of judicial authorities to peaceful protests in that regard. Women who do not wear a hijab in public can be sentenced to up to two months in prison or be fined. A number of female protestors have been arrested, notably among those involved in the “My Stealthy Freedom” campaign online149 and some of those who became known as the “Girls of Revolution Street”. According to information received by OHCHR, while most were released on bail, some female protesters were sentenced to up to two years in prison on the charge of “encouraging moral corruption”. 63. The Secretary-General is deeply concerned at the reported arrest and treatment of women human rights defenders. Hoda Amid, a lawyer primarily representing vulnerable women, was arrested in September 2018. Women human rights defenders Najmeh Vahedi and Rezvaneh Mohammadi were also detained at this time. All three women were released on bail in November, pending trial. 150 Atena Daemi and Golrokh Iraee – other women human rights defenders – remain detained, despite calls, including by human rights organizations and the European Parliament, for their release. 151 III. Cooperation with international human rights mechanisms and OHCHR A. Cooperation with human rights treaty bodies 64. The Islamic Republic of Iran has ratified six core international human rights treaties and is a signatory to the Optional Protocol to the Convention on the Rights of the Child on the involvement of children in armed conflict. The Secretary-General welcomes the cooperation of the Government with the treaty bodies. He encourages the Government to submit periodic reports, including under the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights and the International Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Racial Discrimination, which have been overdue since 2014 and 2013 respectively, and under the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights, which was due in May 2018. 146 147 148 149 150 151 16 See www.amar.org.ir/Portals/1/releases/LFS_Year_1396.pdf. See www.ilo.org/wcmsp5/groups/public/---ed_norm/---relconf/documents/meetingdocument/wcms_ 617065.pdf. See www.wipo.int/edocs/lexdocs/laws/en/ir/ir009en.pdf. See www.facebook.com/StealthyFreedom/. See www.en-hrana.org/womens-rights-activist-hoda-amid-released-on-bail, www.enhrana.org/womens-rights-activist-najmeh-vahedi-released-on-bail and www.en-hrana.org/updatewomens-rights-activist-rezvaneh-mohammadi-transferred-to-evin-prison. See www.hrw.org/news/2018/04/10/iran-jailed-rights-defender-ailing, www.amnesty.org/en/latest/news/2018/03/iran-new-evidence-of-appalling-treatment-of-womenhuman-rights-defenders-held-in-shahre-rey-prison/ and www.europarl.europa.eu/news/cs/pressroom/20180315IPR99813/release-and-urgent-medical-help-for-women-human-rights-defenders-iniran.