A call to the International Community: Covid -19 is threatening the lives of Female Political Prisoners in Evin Prison
18-July-2021
Category: Prisoners، Women
18-July-2021
Newsgroup: Women – Prisoners –
Breathing in Confinement: With four women political prisoners in Evin Prison having captured Covid-19, the situation in the ward, is chaotic and the lives of all prisoners are in imminent danger.
According to Breathing in Confinement, the news organ of the Prisoners’ Rights League in Iran, four of the political prisoners in the women’s ward of Evin Prison, have been diagnosed with Covid-19 and are being held in unequipped women’s quarantine ward, without receiving any medical care.
A number of other prisoners, including Mojgan Kavousi also, have shown the symptoms of Covid-19. The prison officials, however, ignoring the problem, do not provide any medical care to the prisoners.
The political prisoner, Alieh Motalebzadeh in an audio file from inside the prison describes the situation of her fellow prisoners as critically dangerous. She says that in response to the prisoners who protested their life-threatening situation, the deputy director of the prison, told that “people are dying outside as well.”
Alieh Motalebzadeh, says that after the outbreak of Covid-19 in Evin Prison, the prison authorities have placed the sick prisoners in the unequipped quarantine ward and closed the door behind, without providing them with any medical care.
In her audio file, Ms. Motalebzadeh says that the prison authorities have refused to grant leave to the prisoners.
Alieh Motalebzadeh says that she also complained to the deputy director of the prison, regarding the situation of Covid-19 patients in prison, but he replied that people were dying outside the prison as well.
“The deputy director of the prison came earlier today, and I told him that it was as if you closed the doors and left the prisoners to die here. He simply said: ‘The outside situation is also the same, people are dying outside as well.’ That’s it, it does not matter. You will also die.”
The environmental activist Sepideh Kashani also, is one of the prisoners who has captured Covid-19. She has been in prison with her husband, Hooman Jokar since the winter of 2018. She has been sentenced to 6 years in prison by Branch 15 of the Revolutionary Court.
The retired teacher Zeinab Hamrang Seyed Beigloo, also is spending her 5 years sentence. She was arrested in September 2020, on a trip to West Azerbaijan from where she was transferred to Evin Prison.
The news of Zeinab Hamrang and Sepideh Kashani having captured Covid-19 had been previously published. Over the last two days, Zahra Jamali and Arezoo Ghasemi also have been added to the Covid-19 patients.
In addition, the mental condition of Rahela Ahmadi, the mother of political prisoner Saba Kordafshari, is described as very poor and dangerous following her mother’s death. Rahela Ahmadi’s mother died on Thursday, July 15, 2021, without being permitted to see her daughter and granddaughter for the last time. The judicial authorities of the Islamic Republic refused to grant leave to Ms. Ahmadi and her daughter Saba, for the last visit and even for participation in the funeral.
Furthermore, the prison authorities in an illegal act have announced that they do not recognize the ward representative or council whose members have been elected by the prisoners. Instead, they have said that henceforward, the representative should be appointed by the prison officials. This provoked the female prisoners’ protests, who stopped carrying out their daily activities as a protest act.
The Prisoners’ Rights League in Iran, expressing concern over the situation of female political prisoners in Evin Prison, calls on all human rights communities, the Special Rapporteur on the situation of human rights in the Islamic Republic, and the UN Human Rights Council, to take effective action to save the lives of prisoners.