Iran’s Nobel winner Narges Mohammadi given new prison term of more than seven years
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A handout photo provided by the Narges Mohammadi Foundation on Oct 2, 2023 shows an undated, unlocated photo of Iranian rights campaigner Narges Mohammadi.
PHOTO: AFP
DUBAI - Iranian Nobel Peace Prize winner Narges Mohammadi is in “deteriorating health” after ending a nearly week-long hunger strike, her supporters said on Feb 8, as the authorities handed the campaigner a fresh prison sentence.
Mohammadi, who won the peace prize in 2023, has spent the last two months in prison after speaking out against the government at a funeral ceremony in December.
She was sentenced on Feb 7 to six years in prison on charges of harming national security and was also given a 1½-year prison sentence for “propaganda” against Iran’s Islamic system, her foundation said in a statement.
The statement said that in a gesture of defiance, Mohammadi did not offer any defence or make any statement after being taken before judges and swiftly sentenced.
“Narges offered no defence, steadfast in her belief that this judiciary holds no legitimacy. She views these proceedings as a mere charade with a predetermined end,” her Paris-based husband Taghi Rahmani said in a statement.
Other punishments included being exiled for two years to the city of Khosf in the eastern province of South Khorasan, her Iranian lawyer Mostafa Nili told AFP in Tehran, confirming the details of the sentence.
Mohammadi had revealed the sentence in a phone call with Mr Nili, only her second to the outside world since being arrested in the eastern city of Mashhad in December.
Mohammadi had on Feb 2 begun a hunger strike to protest against the conditions of her imprisonment and the inability to make phone calls to lawyers and family.
“Narges Mohammadi ended her hunger strike today on its sixth day, while reports indicate her physical condition is deeply alarming,” the foundation said.
Mohammadi told Mr Nili she was transferred to the hospital just three days ago “due to her deteriorating health”, it added.
“However, she was returned to the Ministry of Intelligence’s security detention centre in Mashhad before completing her treatment,” the foundation said.
“Her continued detention is life threatening and a violation of human rights laws.”
Mr Ali Rahmani, son of imprisoned Iranian human rights activist Narges Mohammadi, speaks after receiving the Nobel Peace Prize on behalf of his mother at Oslo City Hall, Norway on Dec 10, 2023.
PHOTO: REUTERS
‘Gravely concerned for my mom’
Mohammadi was arrested before protests erupted nationwide later in December. The movement peaked in January as the authorities launched a crackdown that activists say has left thousands dead.
Under Iranian law, jail sentences run concurrently, but her foundation said even taking this into account, she faces “more than 17 years of active imprisonment, in addition to the 154 lashes carried over from her previous sentences”.
Over the past quarter-century, Mohammadi, 53, has been repeatedly tried and jailed for her vocal campaigning against Iran’s use of capital punishment and the mandatory dress code for women.
She has spent much of the past decade behind bars and has not seen her twin children, who live in Paris, since 2015.
“I am gravely concerned for my mum. She, along with all political prisoners in Iran, must be released immediately,” said her daughter Kiana.
Mohammadi strongly backed the 2022-2023 protests sparked by the death in custody of Iranian Kurdish woman Mahsa Amini.
She has also regularly predicted the downfall of the clerical system that has ruled Iran since the 1979 Islamic revolution.
The Iranian authorities have arrested more than 50,000 people as part of their crackdown on protests, according to US-based Human Rights Activists News Agency. AFP
