Prominent Iranian political prisoner Fatemeh Sepehri was sent back to jail a day after being granted home leave following heart surgery, her brother says.
Asghar Sepehri said on the social media platform X on October 19 that his sister was thrown behind bars in Vakil Abad prison in the northeastern city of Mashhad.
“[Supreme Leader] Ali Khamenei is responsible for anything that happens to my sister and brothers” while in custody, he added.
Hours before his sister's rearrest, he wrote that Branch 21 of the Revolutionary Court demanded her to turn herself back into prison.
Sepehri went home on October 18 after undergoing treatment at Mashhad’s Ghaem Hospital following open heart surgery on October 1.
Her two brothers were arrested by security forces when they went to the hospital to visit the activist.
In a video clip released earlier this week from the hospital, Sepehri condemned the Hamas attack on Israel on October 7 and criticized the "agents of the Islamic Republic of Iran" for supporting the Palestinian armed group.
She also expressed hope that the ongoing turmoil in the Middle East will lead to the downfall of the Islamic Republic.
"I emphatically declare that the Iranian nation stands in solidarity with the people of Israel," she said.
The outspoken pro-democracy advocate was arrested in Mashhad on September 12, 2022, and was sentenced in February this year to a total of 18 years in prison on charges including “propaganda against the regime,” “cooperating with hostile countries” and “insulting” Khamenei and his predecessor, Ruhollah Khomeini.
She is one of the 14 signatories of a 2019 statement calling for Khamenei’s resignation, the abolition of the Islamic Republic and the establishment of a secular government.
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