Well, to be precise, what is being signalled is women members of the Cabinet:
Iran's president, Mahmoud Ahmadi-Nejad, said he would nominate at least three female ministers to his cabinet, reaching out to the women who have been particularly active in post-election protests against his government:
http://preview.tinyurl.com/q2b5ad
Even if it is a result of mere politics of the most cynical sort, the move should be welcomed by all people of goodwill as a dilution of Islamism (which, by the way, is a heady but contradictory mixture of Koranic, traditional and reactionary views).
Most importantly, it should be welcomed as signalling a change in the oppression of women that has occured again in newly-Islamised societies - think, for example of the re-suppression of education for women in Afghanistan and of acid being thrown on women who are not dressed in the traditional burqa.
If women are in the cabinet in Iran it will be more difficult to suppress women's rights not only in Iran but in all the places where Iran's influence runs, from Lebanaon to Afghanistan (and much wider!).
Professor Prabhu Guptara
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