Iran: Activist In Solitary Confinement For Months

Abbas Vahedian is sentenced to a total of 21 years in prison, consisting of an 11-year prison sentence, issued by Branch 3 of the Revolutionary Court of Mashhad in December 2021, and a 10-year prison sentence, issued by Branch 5 of the Revolutionary Court of Mashhad in October 2021. In both cases, he was suddenly taken, without prior notice and information about the nature of charges against him, from detention to the Revolutionary Court of Mashhad, told by judges whom he has described as aggressive and biased that he is on trial for acting against national security, and asked if he has anything to present in his defence. In both instances, he responded that due to the serious legal breaches committed, he did not recognize the legitimacy of the sessions convened and insisted for his lawyer’s presence. In both cases, the presiding judges ended the sessions within minutes and refused to reconvene. His 10-year prison sentence was finalized 20 days after it was issued following his refusal to file an appeal. His appeal against the 11-year sentence is currently pending.  

The 11-year prison sentence consists of one year for “spreading propaganda against the system” and 10 years for “founding groups with the purpose of disrupting national security”. The groups cited in the court verdict are the Convergence Council of Iranian Movements, known by its Persian acronym Shahjaa, and Iran Think Room (Otagh-e Fekr-e Iran). The former group, Shahjaa, advocates, according to its website, for the transition of Iran, through peaceful means, from the Islamic Republic system, which it characterizes as a “corrupt and oppressive theocracy”, to a secular democratic system committed to international human rights law. Abbas Vahedian has noted that he was not a founding member of Shahjaa, but served as its spokesperson since its establishment on 8 April 2021 until 17 May 2021. The latter group, Iran Think Room, was an informal brainstorming group which led on several online campaigns launched in the months prior to Iran’s presidential elections in June 2021, including “No to the Islamic Republic” and “The Campaign to Create Shame”. The separate 10-year prison sentence is solely in connection with an open letter that Abbas Vahedian and 13 other co-signatories published on 12 June 2019 calling for the resignation of Iran’s Supreme Leader, Ali Khamenei, and a fundamental change to the country’s constitution. This peaceful activity formed the foundation of multiple spurious charges of which he was convicted, including “insulting the Supreme Leader”, “gathering and colluding against national security”, “spreading propaganda against the system”, and “disrupting public opinion”. 

Abbas Vahedian was arrested by several ministry of intelligence agents in a village near Rezvanshahr in northern Gilan province on 1 September 2021 following his participation in an online debate wherein he reiterated his political beliefs. Apart from two brief family visits in December and January 2021, which took place in the presence of intelligence agents, his contact with his family has been limited to weekly calls, which generally last a few minutes and are made in the presence of an agent, preventing him from speaking freely. 

In recent years, Iranian authorities have subjected Abbas Vahedian to arbitrary detention, enforced disappearance, torture, and other ill-treatment on multiple occasions because of his peaceful political activism. He was last arbitrarily detained between 18 August 2019 and 19 July 2020 due to the aforementioned June 2019 open letter. His arrest at that time was carried out in a violent way; an intelligence agent hit him in the face with a sharp object, causing open wounds in his mouth. Following his arrest, the authorities concealed his fate and whereabouts for two months from his family, thereby, subjecting him to enforced disappearance. After his transfer to Mashhad’s Vakilabad prison, he told his family that he had been held in solitary confinement in an informal, unmarked ministry of intelligence detention facility in Mashhad. In Vakilabad prison, he was held in a general ward next to prisoners convicted of violent crimes and several prisoners there repeatedly threatened to kill or otherwise harm him. He says that on one occasion, several prisoners attempted to stab him in the neck with a knife. On at least three other occasions, he said that a prisoner jumped on him while he was asleep, causing him head injuries. In the first quarter of 2020, he contracted pulmonary tuberculosis in prison, likely through an infected cellmate, leading to severe coughing, chest pain and breathing difficulties for weeks as well as weight loss. Even though the specialist medical care he required was not available in prison, prosecution and prison officials refused to transfer him to a medical facility outside prison. Soon afterwards, he contracted Covid-19, for which he did not receive adequate medical care either. Following numerous follow-ups by his family, he was eventually released on bail on 19 July 2020. He has since suffered from chronic lung complications, which according to the doctors he consulted following his release from prison is due to the lack of proper medical care for his lung infection during his imprisonment.