Uncategorised

Iran is denying urgent lifesaving medical treatment to a political prisoner who was diagnosed with a rare form of bone cancer.

Arash Sadeghi, 38, is serving 19 years in prison for peaceful human rights work, which includes speaking to the media and Amnesty International.

He has been suffering from medical problems since he was sent to Raja’i Shahr prison in Karaj in June 2016. It is believed that they started with an untreated infection on his shoulder that developed after an operation, causing him severe pain in his arm.

Iranian authorities have extended the travel ban on the widow of an Iranian-Canadian environmentalist who died under suspicious circumstances in prison last year after being arrested on suspicion of spying, according to state-run news agency IRNA on Tuesday.

Payam Derafshan, the lawyer for Widow Maryam Mombeini, said that he had gone to a Tehran court on Sunday to seek an end to the year-long travel ban imposed on her following the death of her husband Kavous Seyed-Emami, but the court extended the ban instead.

Political prisoner Arzhang Davoudi has staged a hunger strike, protesting the cruel and inhuman conditions he has been forced to endure in solitary confinement.

This is not the first time that the prisoner has gone on a hunger strike to highlight poor prison condition.

He went on hunger strike in the quarantine section of Zahedan prison in February 2018. Davoudi had described the reason for his hunger strike as such: “I am on hunger because I have been deprived of free air and sunlight since August.”

Iranian prison guards in riot gear beat prisoners and used tear gas, firearms and pepper spray during raids inside the Qarchak women’s prison, east of Tehran, family members of the prisoners held at the facility reported.

This raid, taking place Thursday night, involved units equipped with pepper spray and tear gas attacking Hall 1 and 2 where prisoners convicted of drugs charges are held.

Reacting to an article published in the Iran official daily newspaper describing the situation of political prisoners as favorable, young political prisoners, Saba Kord Afshari and Yasamin Aryani, sent an open letter from notorious Evin Prison, revealing tough prison conditions.

On 17 January, 2019, the official Iran daily newspaper claimed that “The security (political) convicts have no problems and are in the best situation in terms of phone calls, family visits and using medical facilities.”

 Iranian authorities have deliberately deprived prisoner of conscience Majid Asadi of the special medical care he requires.

Majid Asadi, having been sentenced to six years in prison in 2017 for his peaceful human rights activities, suffers from multiple diseases including ulcers, duodenal ulcer, liver cyst, waist disk, and spinal rheumatism.

With the public outcry over torture in Iran’s detention centres, Farangis Mazloumi mother of political prisoner Soheil Arabi recounts her experience of daily torture saying she is being tortured every day and every night.

Iranian labour protest leader, Esmail Bakhshi was arrested for the second time, state media reported Monday.

Bakhshi “was arrested last night in cooperation with security and law enforcement forces,” Mansour Mohammadi, the prosecutor general of Dezful, in Khuzestan province, told the judiciary’s news website Mizan Online.

Bakhsi who is a labour leader at Haft Tapeh Sugar Cane complex workers in Shush, in the oil-rich province of Khuzestan, southwest Iran, was arrested on November 20, 2018, during demonstrations by workers demanding unpaid wages.

Iranian security authorities arrested two other Christian converts, Farzad Behzadizadeh and Abdolah Yosefi Sheikh Robat in Ahvaz on 2 December, 2018, the same day as two Christian sisters Shima and Shokoufeh Zanganeh were arrested.