Health and Hygiene

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 …

RFL/RE – The mother of jailed Iranian activist Behnam Mousivand has released a video warning that her son’s physical condition following hunger strikes in prison is poor and asked for help from the international community and human rights organizations to pressure Tehran for immediate medical attention. In the video, Mousivand’s mother quotes doctors as saying if her son does not …

Iranwire – Jailed civil rights activist Sepideh Gholian has been transferred to Tehran’s Taleghani Hospital after becoming ill on hunger strike. The 27-year-old writer has been nil by mouth since last Friday to protest her being held in a prison far away from her family, a tactic routinely deployed by the judiciary to put more pressure on prisoners of conscience. …

CHRI – A recent trip by a UN special rapporteur to Iran could have been a historic moment—had she responded to an open letter by human rights activists to meet. Instead, Alena Douhan, the UN’s special rapporteur on the negative impact of the unilateral coercive measures, ignored the appeal and carried out her trip—applauded by the government in Iran—as planned. Three months later, at least …

September 7, 2022 – A political prisoner’s precarious health situation is raising fears of another preventable death in Iranian state custody due to the authorities’ denial of proper medical treatment, said the Center for Human Rights in Iran (CHRI) in a statement today. Since May 2022, family members of human rights activist Behnam Mousivand, 35, have been calling on judicial officials to allow him to …

Al-Monitor – Baquer Namazi, a US citizen held in Iran for more than six years, is again in urgent need of surgery to clear life-threatening blockages in an artery to his brain, his family said Tuesday.  Multiple neurologists have assessed that the 85-year-old needs surgery within weeks to address blockages in his left internal carotid artery. Namazi, who Iranian authorities have …

Iran-HR – Political prisoner Akbar Bagheri was returned to prison on Tuesday before completing his medical treatment. He was sent on leave from the Greater Tehran Penitentiary on July 11 but taken to Evin Prison on September 30, before completing his medical treatment. Akbar Bagheri was initially arrested in May 2017 when security forces raided his home. They confiscated his …

theguardian – The outgoing UN human rights commissioner, Michelle Bachelet, has said that China had committed “serious human rights violations” against Uyghur Muslims in Xinjiang province which may amount to crimes against humanity. Bachelet’s damning report was published with only 11 minutes to go before her term came to an end at midnight Geneva time. Publication was delayed by the eleventh-hour delivery of an …

Iran-HRM – Political prisoner Seyed Hossein Seyedi, who was arrested during the November 2019 Iran protests and was released on bail after serving five months in prison due to his health, was once again detained on August 4 after agents stormed his home. The 66-year-old political prison is currently in critical condition in Tehran’s Evin Prison. Seyed Hossein Seyedi was …

Iran-HRM – With the re-emergence of COVID-19 in Iran, the number of prisoners suffering from this disease has also increased. Many political prisoners infected with COVID-19 are deprived of proper treatment. The poor and unsanitary conditions of prisons, the lack of health and medical facilities, and the overpopulation of prisons have all helped in spreading the infectious disease. In addition …