It has been nearly a year since the political prisoner Varisha Moradi was arrested and placed in a state of uncertainty. Her first court session was held on June 16, 2024, in Branch 15 of the Tehran Revolutionary Court, presided over by Judge Abolqasem Salavati. The charges against her include armed insurgency (Bagh-ye) and membership in opposition groups against the regime.
Illegal Actions Against Varisha Moradi
By order of Judge Salavati, since mid-May 2024, Varisha Moradi has been deprived of in-person meetings and phone calls with her family and lawyer. This illegal action has put additional psychological pressure on her, indicating the authorities’ efforts to break her spirit.
Denial of Defense Rights to Varisha Moradi’s Lawyers
In the court session on Sunday, June 16, 2024, Judge Salavati did not allow her lawyers to defend their client. This move is a blatant violation of the legal rights of the prisoner and highlights the oppressive behavior of the Iranian judiciary. The date for the next court session has not yet been set, and Varisha Moradi remains deprived of her right to phone calls and in-person visits.
Conditions of Arrest
Varisha Moradi is a women’s rights activist and a member of the Free Women’s Society of Eastern Kurdistan (KJAR). She was abducted on August 1, 2023, in Kermanshah, on her way to Sanandaj in western Iran.
She was transferred from the Sanandaj Intelligence Department detention center to Ward 209 of Evin Prison by the end of August. On December 26, 2023, after the interrogation process was completed, Moradi was transferred to the women’s ward of Evin Prison.
Varisha Moradi, who is originally from Sanandaj, was charged in January by the Fifth Investigative Branch of the Tehran Public Prosecutor’s Office. Her case was then referred to the 15th Branch of the Tehran Revolutionary Court on charges of “armed rebellion” for membership in an opposition group.
According to reports, Varisha spent the first five months of her imprisonment in solitary confinement in the detention center of the Intelligence Department in Sanandaj and in Ward 209 in Evin Prison, where she was severely tortured to make false confessions against herself.
Efforts to Break the Spirit of Female Political Prisoners
Judicial officials and interrogators in Iran’s prisons are trying to break the spirit of female political prisoners by keeping them in a state of uncertainty, adding sentences with vague charges, and transferring them to solitary confinement. These actions clearly violate human rights and show a lack of adherence to legal principles and justice within the Iranian judicial system.