Transfer of Ehsan Faridi, a Student on Death Row, to Tabriz Intelligence Office Raises Fears of Torture to Extract Confession
21-October-2025
Category: Prisoners
20 October 2025
News Category: Prisoners
Breathing in Confinement – The transfer of Ehsan Faridi, a university student and political prisoner sentenced to death, to the Tabriz Intelligence Office has heightened concerns about possible coercion and violations of his human rights.
According to Breathing in Confinement, the news outlet of the Prisoners’ Rights League in Iran, Faridi, a 22-year-old student sentenced to death, has been moved from Tabriz Central Prison to the Intelligence Office. His mother announced the news on Instagram, adding that after three days with no information about his whereabouts, she learned he was being held at the Intelligence detention facility.
Given that Faridi’s death sentence has already been upheld by the Supreme Court, his transfer to a security detention centre has raised serious fears among human-rights groups and his family about the risk of pressure, torture, or attempts to obtain a forced confession. Such acts—if carried out—would constitute a clear violation of Article 7 of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (prohibition of torture and inhuman treatment), Article 14 of the same Covenant (right to a fair trial), as well as the principles of fair procedure set out in the Constitution of the Islamic Republic of Iran.
Faridi, a student at the Faculty of Engineering, University of Tabriz, was arrested in 2023 and released on bail on 18 March 2024. He was initially sentenced to six months’ imprisonment on the charge of propaganda against the state, and eighteen months in another part of the case. However, on 18 June 2024, he was summoned to Branch 15 of the Tabriz Revolutionary Court’s Prosecutor’s Office, where the charges were changed to “corruption on earth (efsad-e fel-arz)” and “membership in the People’s Mojahedin Organisation of Iran (PMOI/MEK)”. Subsequently, Branch 1 of the Tabriz Revolutionary Court sentenced him to death, a verdict later confirmed by the Supreme Court.
From the outset, proceedings in his case have been marred by repeated violations of fair-trial guarantees, including restricted access to an independent lawyer, lack of transparency in interrogations, and the denial of an effective right of defence.