Narges Mohammadi Released From Prison

The Chief Justice of Zanjan Province has announced the release of human rights activist Narges Mohammadi.

On Thursday, October 8, Esmail Sadeghi Niaraki, the chief justice of Zanjan Province, confirmed that Narges Mohammadi's eight and a half-year sentence had been commuted on the principle of “Islamic Kindness”. She is understood to have been released late on Wednesday.  

The anti-death penalty campaigner was the spokeswoman for the Defenders of Human Rights Center in Iran, founded by Nobel Peace laureate Shirin Ebadi, before she was arrested in May 2015. She was initially held in Evin Prison, but after participating in a sit-in in in support of the families of those killed in the November 2019 protests, she was transferred to Zanjan Prison amid reports of violence and beatings.

Ms. Mohammadi was one of 15 prominent Iranian activists, alongside human rights lawyer Nasrin Sotoudeh, opposition politician Abolfazl Ghadyani and filmmaker Jafar Panahi, who signed an open letter in 2018 demanding a referendum on Iran’s form of government.

As an engineer and physicist, in 2018 she was also awarded the Andrei Sakharov Prize, which recognises the outstanding achievements of scientists in upholding human rights.

Her release comes days after the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights, Michelle Bachelet, called on Iran to “immediately release” political prisoners who had so far been excluded from Iran’s program to free up overcrowded prisons in response to the coronavirus pandemic.

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