We gathered on Friday March 8, 2024 at the Minnesota State Capitol Rotunda to celebrate International Women's Day by declaring our support for women political prisoners in Iran and Russia. The gathering was addressed by representatives of the Advocates for Human Rights and Center for Victims of Torture.
Short biographies of a number of women political prisoners from Iran and Russia were read. The Iranian women political prisoners highlighted are listed below (in alphabetical order):
Maryam Akbari Monfared
Maryam Akbari Monfared, born in 1975 and mother of three, is an Iranian political activist who lost four siblings in the 1988 massacre of political prisoners.
Akbari Monfared was arrested in December 2009 and was kept in solitary confinement for the first 43 days of her imprisonment. The lawyer assigned to her by the Iranian government only met and spoke to her during the trial, which consisted of a single hearing of less than one hour. She was sentenced to 15 years in prison by the revolutionary court in Tehran in May 2010, which condemned her for "enmity against God" (moharebeh).
Amnesty International, in a 2021 Urgent Action bulletin, stated that she “has been held in cruel and inhumane conditions in a distant prison in Semnan province far from her family” “in reprisal for her open letters condemning the Iranian authorities’ human rights violations and seeking truth and justice for her siblings who were forcibly disappeared and extrajudicially executed in secret in 1988.”
In a letter sent from prison in December 2022 she wrote “As of December 29, 2022, thirteen years have passed since I was separated from my 4-year-old Sarah and my two 12-year-old daughters on that winter midnight.”
“Without giving me a chance to say goodbye to my loved ones, they took me to Evin prison to give some explanations, and made the ridiculous promise that ‘you will return to your children in the morning’.”
“This is not a 4,000-page story, but the pure reality of a life under the domination of fascists who imposed it on us while we refused to give in. On this side of the bars, in the dark desert of torture and oppression, as far as one can see – even where one cannot see – there is just vileness and brutality.”
In July of 2023, she was arraigned on five new charges after being incarcerated for 13.5 years without a single day of leave. These included “propaganda against the state,” “assembly and collusion,” “dissemination of lies,” “insulting (Khamenei),” and “encouraging people to disrupt public order.” These charges are based on the letters and reports published by her on social media. She is currently held in Semnan prison.
Sepideh Gholian
Sepideh Gholian, born in 1994, is an Iranian political activist and freelance journalist. On November 18, 2018, Gholian, was arrested while reporting on a labor protest organized by the Workers Union of Haft Tappeh Sugarcane Company. Union spokesman Esmail Bakhshi and a dozen other trade unionists were also arrested during the protest.
On November 29, 2018, while Gholian and Bakhshi were still detained, The Vahed Syndicate, a trade union representing transit workers, revealed in a statement that Bakhshi had been briefly hospitalized due to torture he had suffered while in custody. Immediately upon release, Gholian confirmed that both of them had been subjected to torture by the security forces. They subsequently told Amnesty International that they had been beaten, slammed against walls, shoved to the ground, humiliated with flogging, and threatened with sexual assault and murder. Gholian stated that during her daily interrogation sessions, which started around 10 am and lasted until the early hours of the following morning, intelligence officials repeatedly subjected her to sexual insults such as "whore”, accused her of having sexual relationships with workers, and threatened to make sure that her family would receive information that would make them murder Sepideh for "honor".
On January 19, 2019, the Iranian state television broadcast what it claimed to be a documentary showing that Gholian and other activists have connections to the Trump administration, communist groups and other Iranians in diaspora who pursue the overthrow of the regime. The broadcast, recorded during their detention, contained videos of a visibly distraught Gholian and Bakhshi confessing to their crimes against the state.
She was arrested again on January 20, 2019. In a phone interview, Gholian's father told a reporter: "At 7 in the morning, 12 male and 2 female officers violently raided my home, broke my son's teeth, assaulted me and my wife, and told us they'd kill our daughter."
After over 4 years, Gholian was released from Evin prison in Tehran on March 15, 2023. Footage of her chanting anti-Khamenei slogans immediately after her release in front of the prison went viral online. She was arrested again just hours later and was handed a two-year sentence two months later.
Bahareh Hedayat
Bahareh Hedayat was born in 1981. She was one of the activists who worked on the “One Million Signatures” campaign to change laws that discriminate against women in Iran. She has been arrested and imprisoned several times since 2007. In fact, plain cloths officers took her to prison on the day before her wedding. Hedayat experienced severe negligence and was denied access to her medical needs at various times throughout her imprisonment. She was also on occasion denied family visits and phone calls. In 2012 Hedayat was awarded the “Edelstam Prize” for outstanding contributions and exceptional courage in standing up for one's beliefs in defense of human rights.
On June 14, 2016, the United Nation's Working Group on Arbitrary Detention issued an opinion demanding Hedayat's immediate release, pointing to her imprisonment since 2009 being arbitrary and against international law.
Hedayat was re-arrested for her participation in a peaceful gathering to condemn the downing of the Ukraine International Airlines Flight 752 by Iran's Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps in January 2020 and has been sentenced to four years and eight months in prison.
Hedayat was again arrested by security forces in Tehran on October 11, 2022, amid the Mahsa Amini protests. After eight days of detention, in a phone call, she informed her family that she was in ward 209 of Evin prison and did not know the reason for her arrest, or the charges against her.
She started a hunger strike on August 31, 2023 to protest repression and the death of another prisoner, Javad Rouhi. In her statement, Hedayat articulates her motives: "I, in obedience to my conscience and in its defense, protest against the tragic death of Javad Rouhi in prison and express my support for the year-long, unyielding resistance of women in my country for freedom. I hereby declare my hunger strike, commencing from Friday evening. May this humble contribution serve the cause of freedom for Iran, a nation weary of tyranny."
She is currently held in Evin prison in Tehran.
Zeynab Jalalian
Zeynab Jalalian, Iran’s longest-serving and only female political prisoner serving a life sentence, marked her seventeenth year in prison last week. Throughout her imprisonment, Jalalian has been denied the right to furlough and has been transferred several times to different prisons across the country. Jalalian was born in 1982 in a village near Maku, and was arrested in March 2008 in Kermanshah and transferred to the detention center of the Intelligence Ministry. Her trial before the Court of First Instance took place in December 2008; after conducting a summary trial, the Court found Jalalian guilty and sentenced her to death, on charges of being a member of a banned Kurdish group. Based on her alleged membership of that group, she was accused of fighting God (mohareb) and given the death penalty, Jalalian has denied the charges. Her death sentence was confirmed by the Iranian Supreme Court in November 2009 but was later reduced to life in prison.
In April 2016, the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights issued an official request to the Islamic Republic of Iran to release Zeynab Jalalian immediately, as the deprivation of her liberty is arbitrary, being in contravention of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, and the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights .
Jalalian has been subjected to torture by the Iranian authorities and was denied access to treatments and specialized medical care despite her deteriorating health. She has had several medical conditions, including heart problem, intestinal and kidney infections, a worsening eye condition, and a severe dental infection.
She has been transferred to prisons in different cities since July 2020, including Varamin, Kerman, and Kermanshah, at times in solitary confinement, and is currently being held in Yazd prison.
Last week, in the run up to the Iranian regime’s sham elections, Jalalian sent a message asking people to boycott the elections saying in part: “Because I demanded people’s rights, I am detained in prison, so I ask you to stay in your homes and not go to the elections tomorrow in Iran.”
Narges Mansouri
Narges Mansouri, 46 and the mother of a 12-year-old, is a member of the Syndicate of the workers of Tehran and Suburbs Bus Company. Mansouri was initially arrested in April 2022, released on bail but re-arrested on December 1, 2023, in Khoy and transferred to Evin Prison. She is one of 14 women activists in Iran who publicly called for Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei to resign in 2019. She was handed a five-year sentence for signing that letter.
She started a hunger strike on December 25, 2023. In protest of pressures imposed on her family, she refrained from taking food and medicine and held a sit-in outside the sentry’s office in the women’s ward of Evin on December 30, protesting the verdict issued to confiscate her mother’s only house, which had been set as Ms. Mansouri’s bail. She was handed an additional three-year sentence no national security charges while being detained. Her lawyer announced that she has been threatened to death twice from a senior office in prison. She is currently held in Evin prison.
Narges Mohammadi
Narges Mohammadi was born in Zanjan, Iran in 1972. In 2003, she joined the Defenders of Human Rights Center, founded by Shirin Ebadi (Nobel Peace Prize Winner in 2003) and was later elected as Ebadi's deputy and head of the Center's committee on women's rights, often representing the center.
She has been arrested 13 times since 1998 and sentenced to 31 years in prison and 154 lashes.
In September 2011, she was sentenced to 11 years' imprisonment for "acting against the national security, membership of the DHRC and propaganda against the regime". In January 2019, Mohammadi began a hunger strike with the detained British-Iranian citizen Nazanin Zaghari-Ratcliffe in Evin Prison to protest being denied access to medical care. In March 2021, Mohammadi penned the foreword to the Iran Human Rights Annual Report on the Death Penalty in Iran. In December 2022, during the Mahsa Amini protests, the BBC published a report by Mohammadi detailing the sexual and physical abuse of detained women. Mohammadi has been an outspoken critic of solitary confinement, calling it "White Torture" in her 2022 book of the same name.
In 2023, Mohammadi was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize "for her fight against the oppression of women in Iran and her fight to promote human rights and freedom for all". Due to her incarceration, her Nobel Lecture was read by her children who accepted the price on her behalf. Part of this lecture reads:
“I am one of the millions of proud and resilient Iranian women who have risen up against oppression, repression, discrimination, and tyranny. I remember the unnamed and courageous women who have lived a life of resistance in various areas of relentless oppression.
I write this message from behind the high, cold walls of a prison. I am a Middle Eastern woman, and come from a region which, despite its rich civilization, is now trapped amid war, the fire of terrorism, and extremism. I am an Iranian woman, a proud and honorable contributor to civilization, who is currently under the oppression of a despotic religious government. I am a woman prisoner who, in enduring deep and soul-crushing suffering resulting from the lack of freedom, equality, and democracy, has recognized the necessity of her existence and has found faith.”
Mohammadi is currently held in Evin prison in Iran, where she recently went on another hunger strike to protest limits on medical care for her and other inmates, as well as the obligation for women to wear the hijab in Iran, according to her family.
Varisheh Moradi
Varisheh Moradi, a Kurdish women’s rights activist, was arrested on August 1, 2023 while traveling from Marivan to Sanandaj, severely beaten during arrest.
Reports have highlighted the severe torture Varisheh endured while detained in the Intelligence Department center in Sanandaj, including incidents where she vomited blood and lost consciousness.
She spent five months in solitary confinement before being transferred to the women's ward of Evin Prison on December 26, 2023.
She has been indicted by Branch 5 of the Public and Revolutionary Court of Tehran on charges of armed rebellion (Baghi), potentially leading to severe punishment, including the death penalty. The accusation is reportedly linked to her alleged membership in a political opposition party. She has been denied access to legal representation, and since her arrest, she has only had one family visitation.
Sepideh Rashnu
Sepideh Rashnu was born in 1994. She is a human rights defender, graphic designer, and a graduate student of painting. Her commitment to gender equality came into the spotlight after being arrested in July 2022 when a video capturing her encounter with a woman on a bus went viral. In the video, she was confronted by a woman advocating Iran’s law which makes it compulsory for women to wear the hijab. Later in the year, the state-run television, IRIB, played a video of Rashnu's confessions, which is said to have been recorded under duress. It has also been reported that a few days prior to the confession's recording she had been to a hospital in Tehran, because of internal bleeding, possibly because of torture. On August 30, 2022, Rashnu was released on bail.
In December 2022, it was reported that Rashnu was given five years of suspended imprisonment for "‘assembly and collusion against national security,’ ‘propaganda against the regime,’ and ‘not wearing hijab in public.’"
In May 2023, Rashnu was arraigned on charges of "provoking promiscuity and engaging in propaganda against the regime" after sharing photos of herself without a headscarf online. Her arraignment occurred at Evin courthouse. Following her arraignment, Rashnu was held briefly in Ward 209 of Evin prison before being released on bail. In October 2023, a court reportedly sentenced Rashnu to six months in prison for “propaganda against the regime” and “incitement to immorality and indecency.”
In November 2023, Rashnu was included in the BBC's 100 Women list, an annual compilation that spotlights the most inspiring and influential women from around the world.
In December 2023, it was reported that a court in Tehran had sentenced Rashnu to four months in prison for "publishing obscene images" on the internet. According to her lawyer, Rashnu now faces three years and 11 months in prison after this most recent sentence was combined with a three-years-and-seven-months suspended prison sentence.
Fatemeh Sepehri
Fatemeh Sepehri was born in 1964. She is married and has a daughter. Her husband was killed in the 1980s, during the Iran-Iraq War. Sepehri began working as a political activist following Iran's 2009 disputed elections. She was first detained in 2021, during a peaceful protest demanding the release of political prisoners.
Sepehri and her brother, Mohammad Hossein Sepehri, are two of the signatories of the statement of 14 political activists during the 2017–2018 Iranian protests requesting the resignation of Ali Khamenei from his post as the Supreme Leader of the Islamic Republic and later the abolition of Islamic republic and establishment of a democratic secular government. Sepehri received a great deal of attention due to her status as the widow of a war casualty, and came to be known as a martyr's widow. She was arrested and sentenced to five years in prison and 154 lashes.
During the wave of arrests as a result of Mahsa Amini protests, Sepehri was re-arrested on September 2021 and taken to an unknown location after security agents raided her house.
On October 23, 2022 Sepehri’s daughter published a video stating that her mother has been kept in solitary confinement at the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps Intelligence center of Mashhad since her arrest, and after enduring more than a month in solitary confinement she can barely speak. The family's appeal to the case investigator and deputy prosecutor of the Mashhad court to transfer her to the general ward has been ineffective.
In February 2023, Sepehri was given an 18 year prison sentence for "propaganda activities against the Islamic republic", "cooperation with hostile governments", "insulting the late Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini and Ali Khamenei", and "gathering and conspiring against national security”. As of June 2023, she has been held in Vakilabad Prison.
By September 2023, Sepehri was in need of heart surgery. She announced she would only consent to surgery if her brothers were released. She underwent her heart surgery on October 1, released from the hospital and returned to prison on October 7.
Women Journalists: Niloofar Hamedi, Elaheh Mohammadi, and Sara Massoumi
Niloofar Hamedi, born in 1992, and Elaheh Mohammadi, born in 1987, are two Iranian journalists who were arrested following their reporting on the murder of Mahsa Amini in September 2022. They received jail sentences of 12 and 13 years, respectively, for the crime of “collaborating with a hostile U.S. Government”.
Hamedi gained access to Kasra Hospital in Tehran, where Mahsa Amini was being treated following her detention by the morality police for allegedly wearing her compulsory hijab inappropriately. Later that day, and around the time of Amini's death, Hamedi tweeted a photo of Amini's parents hugging and crying in the hospital. That picture quickly spread along with Hamedi's reporting on Amini's death, and eventually spiraled into nationwide protests.
Mohammadi had traveled to Saqqez to cover the funeral of Mahsa Amini, 22, who had spent three days in a coma following her arrest by Tehran's notorious morality police and died on the 16 September. Mohammadi had reported about the police attack at the funeral.
Sara Massoumi, another journalist, was sentenced to 6 months in prison over a Tweet regarding the death of Armita Geravand, the 16-year old girl who was beaten by the morality police in Tehran subway for not wearing a hijab in October 2023, similar to Mahsa Amini’s case.
The Committee to Protect Journalists has called Mohammadi and Hamedi’s conviction “a travesty which serves as a stark testament to the erosion of freedom of speech and the desperate attempts of the Iranian government to criminalize journalism”.
Mohammadi and Hamedi appealed their sentences and were released on bail after 17 months of incarceration but were subsequently charged under the country’s hijab laws after pictures were published of them celebrating their release with their heads uncovered. They are currently free on bail pending the appeal process. Massoumi has not started her prison sentence yet.
Iran has a history of limited press freedoms, with much of the country's media under government control. Independent journalists face constant persecution, including arbitrary arrests and severe sentences following unfair trials. Reporters Without Borders calls Iran the world’s most repressive country in terms of press freedom and one of the world’s biggest jailers for journalists.
