World Outraged By Shocking Photos Of Hunger-Striking Political Prisoner

During his Friday prayer sermon, the country’s most influential Sunni cleric criticized the “violent treatment” of prisoners by the regime, emphasizing that prisoners should be respected and beating them, insulting them, or putting pressure on them is 'haram,' an Arabic term meaning 'forbidden' in Islamic law or sharia. 

"Forced confessions are a violation of the prisoner's right," he said, adding that prisoners should not feel that their interrogators are trying to "attack" them or should not feel that they are stuck in the hands of their "enemies."

Abdolhamid also said officials of the country should be selected from among secular people too, noting that not all Iranian people are "religious", and some do not accept religion. “Don't blame me for this view. Some may not accept religion, but the right policy is that if they have merit and conscience, they should be employed," he added.

He also denounced executions of prisoners in the country, including the hangings over drug-related crimes, saying, "I believe that these executions are not beneficial for the society because drugs are still available as ordinary people do not smuggle them into the country.”

Amid nationwide protests in December, the Islamic Republic hanged four young men arrested during the unrest on spurious charges.

A top advisor to Abdolhamid was arrested earlier in the week, leading to more tensions in Zahedan, capital of Iran's southeastern Sistan-Baluchestan.

“We have just learned that our film Tori and Lokita was included in the selection of the Fajr Festival in Tehran. We demand that our film be withdrawn from the program of this festival which is the showcase of a dictatorial and murderous religious regime that we condemn. We stand in solidarity with those who are fighting against this regime and salute their courage,” said the brother in a post on Instagram.

In their statement Dardenne brothers added they were not aware of the screening of their new film at the Fajr festival in Iran, and they do not know how the Iranian regime got access to this film.

At the same time, the famous Romanian director Cristian Mungiu said he was not aware about the screening of his latest film at Fajr festival. Mungiu said he asked the film distributor to remove his film from Fajr festival immediately.

The move by prominent foreign directors comes at a time when many Iranian artists have also boycotted the festival for the brutality the regime showed in dealing with protests after the death of Mahsa Amini in police custody.

Commenting on the issue of hijab, lawmaker Hossein-Ali Haji-Deligani said in an interview with Entekhab news website recently that he believes the country should have an entity dedicated to “promotion of virtue and prevention of vice” as a completely independent organization to enforce hijab. “Our society and religion do not accept today’s kind of [lenient] hijab,” he said.

Haji-Deligani who is also a member of the parliament’s presidium had said a day earlier that lawmakers, including him, had submitted a new motion to prevent celebrities and those with political, social, military or cultural influence, from “making irrelevant and inexpert statements” on the country’s affairs.

“Unrestricted expression of views is not permissible,” he said when announcing the motion’s submission.

If parliament passes the proposed law, any person of influence could be charged with ‘corruption on earth’ for making “untrue” remarks on matters requiring official clarification provided that their statements cause “serious disruption of public order, insecurity, or major physical damage to individuals, public or private property, or promote moral corruption.

‘Corruption on earth’ is punishable by death in Iran's Sharia-based laws.

The law not only will silence even insiders from criticizing a shortcoming but will eliminate whatever limited criticism appears in media. Journalists will be the top targets of such a law. Already dozens are under arrest or have face political charges.

“This means, in simple terms, that no one is allowed express any beliefs, view or even analysis [over a subject] before authorities make an official statement,” Fararu website wrote about the controversial motion. “Expressing views [over a matter] is criminal if there are rumors going around town about it, even if the rumors are true but different from the official account.”

“The problem is that lawmakers and some decisionmakers think that the events of the past few months resulted from expression of views in social media and the media. They don’t have a proper, logical and clear view of the causes of protests and think they can prevent them from happening again if they shut the mouths of critics and experts,” Nemat Ahmadi, a prominent lawyer and commentator based in Iran, told Fararu.

“As a matter of fact, I believe that this motion is not meant to prevent rumors and lies. If it turns into law, it should be called ‘The Shutting of Mouths Act’,” he added.

Haji-Deligani is a member of the parliament’s totalitarian Paydari faction which consists of members of the small but very influential Islamic Revolution Endurance Front. The party represents the most extreme right end of the conservative-hardliner spectrum collectively known as Principlists.

Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei has on many occasions eulogized the group’s mentor, Ayatollah Mohammad-Taghi Mesbah-Yazdi, who passed away two years ago.

Mesbah-Yazdi famously once said Khamenei’s rule was superior to that of the Islamic Revolution’s founder Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini. He also preached that Khamenei is the representative of the twelfth Shiite Imam Mahdi whose reappearance from occultation will set the day of final judgment in motion.

The faction gained dozens of seats in the current parliament in the 2020 elections with the help of the Khamenei-appointed Guardian Council which disqualified not only reformists but many of Paydari candidate’s conservative rivals.

Conservative politician Mansour Haghighatpour, a former Principlist lawmaker, also criticized Paydari’s new attempt to restrict freedom of expression. “The problem is that after the last election a radical, extremist group has taken control of the parliament that does not want to hear [other] voices, views, or criticism. I mean the same group that is controlling the administration,” Haghighatpour told Fararu.

He added that this extremist group is responsible for “the majority of costs” that the Islamic Republic is now paying domestically and at the international level.

Hossein Kanaani-Moghadam, another former lawmaker and secretary general of the Principlist Green Party, also criticized Haji-Deligani’s recent remarks. “I believe such attempts would not have any outcome other than more corruption, anger, and dissatisfaction in the country.”

A photo of Meysami along with a letter from Rajaei-Shahr prison in Karaj were published on social media Thursday, showing him in a horrible condition after losing weight.

However, the political activist wrote in the letter to prison officials that “I will still insist on my three demands of stopping the execution of protesters, releasing six political prisoners, and stopping mandatory hijab.”

The title of political activist's letter is "For the days of suffering and suffering and suffering".

Farhad Meysami, who has been behind bars since August 2018 was arrested and sentenced to six years in jail for his activism against mandatory hijab.

Last month, in a message from Rajaei-shahr prison, he demanded the immediate release of several civil and political activists.

Meysami also went on a hunger strike in May in protest to the possible execution of Ahmadreza Jalali, a Swedish-Iranian dual national scientist taken hostage since 2016 was under the threat of execution last year.

Meysami later announced that he has ended his two-week hunger strike as Ahmadreza Jalali was not executed. Before the end of that hunger strike, his physical condition was so critical that he was transferred to hospital.

Meysami, a doctor and teacher, said in a message last year that he had met Djalali at Tehran's Evin prison over three years earlier. "He had been on hunger strike in protest to repeated threats of his execution and the effects of which on his body and soul were clearly visible," he wrote.

"Imagine subjecting a human being to this repeatedly. Not once, not twice… Is there any torture worse than this?" Meysami said about repeated threats of execution made against Djalali.

"I don't want to just oppose Dr Djalali's execution, I want to draw attention to something much more important, to draw attention to the fact that they send a man to his death many times and bring him back," he wrote. "Regular and intentional torture like this is definitely crime against humanity."

Meanwhile, famous Iranian filmmaker Jafar Panahi has also gone on a hunger strike to protest his detention in Tehran while his sentence has been declared void by the country’s Supreme Court.

“I firmly declare that in protest against the illegal and inhumane behavior of the judicial and security apparatus and their hostage-taking, I have started a hunger strike since the morning of February 1… I will refuse to eat and drink any food and take medicine until the time of my release,” read a statement he sent to his wife.

Iran has been the scene of nationwide protests against the clerical regime after the death in custody of Mahsa Amini in mid-September.

Authorities have not released any information on the number of detainees, those injured and killed in the protests that began nearly three weeks ago following the death in custody of Mahsa Amini who was arrested for not wearing her hijab “properly”.

Human rights organizations says that nearly 520 protesters, including children, have been killed by security forces during the protests.

In a petition organized by the non-profit Washington-based organization Freedom House, the signatories said that “the triumph of freedom in Iran could renew the global tide of democratization that was so strong in the latter twentieth century but has ebbed in the face of authoritarian counterattack.” “The end of the Islamic Republic’s system of misogyny would constitute a global landmark in the long march toward a world in which women are treated equally.”

The signatories include Nobel prize laureates, heads of states or government officials, members of parliaments, international organizations, as well as numerous public figures from around the world. Former UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon; former prime ministers of Canada Stephen J. Harper, Kim Campbell and Charles Joseph Clark; and former US Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton are a few of the prominent figures. 

Women’s rights activists Masih Alinejad, Nazanin Boniadi, Shirin Ebadi, Azar Nafisi, Roya and Ladan Boroumand from the Boroumand Center for Human Rights in Iran, sportsman-cum- civil rights activist Ali Karimi, and Khalid Aziz from Democratic Party of Iranian Kurdistan as well as exiled prince Reza Pahlavi are some of the Iranian signatories of the petition. 

They appreciated the Iranians who have taken to the streets in rebellion, noting that “the vanguard are young women, but they have been joined by men and people of all ages. With breathtaking courage and unarmed, they have kept coming, even as the regime has shot, hanged, tortured, blinded, raped, beaten, and arrested many thousands.”

Emphasizing that the Iranian people “deserve unstinting support from freedom-loving people around the world,” they called on governments, civic associations, and individuals to speak loudly and more often in support of the protestors and in condemnation of the regime’s repressive actions. 

They also urged legislators to “adopt” individual arrestees, especially those facing execution, and spotlight their plight, and called on governments to “take diplomatic, economic, and symbolic measures to punish the regime and bolster the protestors.”

“All officials involved in the repression, from Supreme Leader Khamenei down to local Basij commanders, should be sanctioned," read their statement, stressing the necessity for the Revolutionary Guard (IRGC) to be added to terrorism lists. 

They also asked high level officials of democratic governments to receive leaders of the opposition, in publicly-announced meetings, highlighting that accurate, reliable, fact-based reporting via international radio, television, and social media reaching Iran should be enhanced, as should assistance to private Iranian exile broadcasting. 

Calling for more tangible measures, they said, “Technical assistance, including equipment, should be given to help the demonstrators counteract censorship and surveillance and to communicate despite the regime’s disruption of Internet service and blocking of websites.”

“Labor unions, governments, and others in the international community should express solidarity with Iranian workers, should share the experiences of other labor struggles for worker rights and democracy, and should also seek ways to provide practical assistance, such as VPNs, other means of communication, and contributions to strike funds if safe and effective channels can be found,” they urged. 

Pledging to do all in their power to support the Iranian struggle for freedom, they called upon all people of good will everywhere to join them. 

Referring to over four months of protests, they said, “The spark was mandatory hijab, but the target of the uprising is the whole theocratic system. Their slogan is Woman, Life, Freedom. The goal they chant is 'Azadi, Azadi, A-za-di,' meaning 'Freedom, Freedom, Freedom.’ Their victory would mean deliverance from a regime that denies free elections, free speech, due process of law, and personal autonomy in matters as simple as the choice of clothing.

International expressions of support for the uprising in Iran is growing as the West has stepped up pressure on the Islamic Republic over its crackdown on protests and arms supply for the Russian invasion of Ukraine as the US, European Union and United Kingdom imposed fresh sanctions on Tehran with more sanctions and condemnations being discussed regularly in the international arena. One of the main points of contention is the terrorist designating of the IRGC, which is in control of most of the governing bodies of the regime, is mainly in charge of the crackdown on dissent, and manages the Islamic Republic’s proxy warfare across the region and hostage diplomacy at home.

The crackdown has become especially tense in Kurdish and Baluch majority regions as the regime has arrested at least 182 Kurds and 185 Balochis in January alone.