Shabtabnews In this dark night, I have lost my way – Arise from a corner, oh you the star of guidance.
RFL/RE – Iranian labor activist Sepideh Gholian has been taken to the hospital after being on a hunger strike for several days to protest authorities ignoring her request to be transferred to a prison in the city where her parents live.
According to Narges Mohammadi, another civil activist imprisoned at Tehran’s Evin prison, Gholian started her hunger strike on September 9. Alieh Matlabzadeh, another imprisoned civil activist, added that Gholian suffered “intestinal bleeding” during the hunger strike.
A source close to Gholian’s family told the Human Rights Activists News Agency (HRANA) that she had been transferred to the Taleghani Hospital in the Iranian capital late on September 13 due to her deteriorating physical condition.
The source added that Gholian remains on her hunger strike even though her parents came to Tehran from the southern city of Dezful to urge her to end the protest.
Gholian was arrested along with about 20 activists, protest organizers, and workers during the Haft Tappeh Sugar Factory strike in November 2018. While most were released on bond the next day, Gholian was imprisoned for a month.
Her release from prison in Ahvaz in December 2018 was short-lived.
After Iranian state television aired footage in January 2019 in which it purported to show Gholian confessing to taking part in alleged Western-backed efforts to overthrow the government, she promptly countered on social media saying she had been beaten and forced to make the false confession.
Following her release on bail in December 2018, Gholian described to Amnesty International the acts of torture she said she suffered at the hands of security officials. She was later sentenced to five years in prison.
