On Nov. 18, 2024, 44 human rights groups urged the U.N. Human Rights Council to secure the release of Iranian Nobel Peace Prize Laureate Narges Mohammadi, one of the country’s most prominent activists, on medical grounds. Since the 1990s, Mohammadi has advocated against the death penalty, solitary confinement and women’s rights.
Mohammadi has spent more than a decade in prison during various stints. Her health has suffered especially since her current period of detention started in November 2021. In 2022, for example, she suffered multiple heart attacks. In November 2024, she had part of the bone in her lower leg removed after a bone lesion was suspected of being cancerous. But she was transferred back to prison just two days later. “Prison authorities’ withholding of essential urgent medical treatment from Mohammadi displays a callous disregard for her health and wellbeing under detention,” the rights groups said. The following is the full text of the open letter.
Free Narges Coalition and Partners Urge UN Human Rights Council to Intervene for Narges Mohammadi’s Urgent Medical Release
To the United Nations Human Rights Council,
We, the undersigned free expression and human rights organizations, write to you in response to the recent news that jailed Iranian Nobel Peace Prize Laureate Narges Mohammadi is in urgent need of medical care. Ahead of Iran’s review under the UN Human Rights Council’s Universal Periodic Review (UPR) mechanism, which takes place over the next two months in Geneva, we urge you to call on the Iranian authorities to grant Mohammadi a medical furlough on humanitarian grounds so that she is able to receive comprehensive and essential care for a range of serious medical conditions.
Mohammadi, a woman human rights defender, journalist, author, and former deputy director and spokesperson of the Defenders of Human Rights Centre (DHRC) in Iran, has spent more than 10 years of her life in prison, with her current period of detention starting in November 2021. She is currently serving sentences totalling 13 years and nine months in prison, on charges including committing “propaganda activity against the state” and “collusion against state security.” An internationally renowned writer and activist, she is the recipient of numerous international awards for her tireless struggle for human rights, including the 2023 Nobel Peace Prize, the 2023 UNESCO/Guillermo Cano World Press Freedom Prize, the 2023 PEN/Barbey Freedom to Write Award, and the 2022 Reporters Without Borders Prize for Courage.
Mohammadi’s health has deteriorated drastically during her long incarceration, most notably in 2022, when she suffered multiple heart attacks before ultimately being transferred to hospital for emergency heart surgery. In early October 2024, Mohammadi’s family expressed serious concerns regarding repeated refusals by Evin prison officials to transfer her to a hospital for appointments to carry out an angiography, an intervention that was prescribed by her cardiologist in March; she was finally allowed to attend an appointment on October 27, 2024. On November 3, her lawyer announced that during her recent medical visit, doctors discovered a bone lesion in her right leg suspected of being cancerous. Although Mohammadi underwent surgery to remove part of the bone in her lower leg, including a bone graft, on November 14, she was transferred back to prison after only two days, against her doctor’s advice and another request from her legal team that she be granted a medical furlough and sentence suspension. Years of imprisonment and months of solitary confinement have severely compromised Mohammadi’s health, leaving her with multiple serious conditions that cannot be addressed through a short, incomplete hospital visit.
Prison authorities’ withholding of essential urgent medical treatment from Mohammadi displays a callous disregard for her health and wellbeing under detention. Worryingly, her case is not unique, but is part of a systematic pattern of arbitrary medical neglect of prisoners, including human rights defenders, journalists, and writers. In a particularly egregious example, poet and filmmaker Baktash Abtin died in state custody in January 2022 after delays in being provided with timely medical care. The news of Mohammadi’s deteriorating medical condition comes amid a current wave of denying medical care to multiple prisoners of conscience in Iran, particularly less well-known detainees. We echo the recent call from 22 prisoners in the women’s ward of Evin Prison, in which they hold the Iranian government and judiciary responsible for creating the conditions whereby the lives of prisoners are put at grave risk, and appeal to international human rights stakeholders in joining them to push for change.
As Mohammadi marks the third anniversary of her unjust detention on November 16, we, the undersigned organizations, are making an urgent call for her full and unconditional release as she should not be in prison in the first place, and in the interim, to be granted an immediate medical furlough on humanitarian grounds, given the precarious state of her health and her need for comprehensive care. In addition, we urge that Iranian authorities stop the criminalization of human rights, and refrain from summoning human rights defenders, journalists, and writers to serve their prison sentences while their health situation is precarious.
We urge the UN Human Rights Council to ensure that the Iranian government commits to implementing without delay a recommendation that it accepted during the last UPR cycle five years ago, namely to ensure that “all individuals in custody receive adequate health care and treatment, including preventive measures, such as screening for medical conditions, free of charge and without discrimination.” Finally, we reiterate our broader call that all those unjustly detained for their human rights work, including expression, be immediately and unconditionally released, and urge the UN Human Rights Council and national and international stakeholders to join us in pressing the Iranian authorities to uphold the basic human rights of all Iranians, especially those who are being prosecuted for their human rights work.
Sincerely,
Abdorrahman Boroumand Center for Human Rights in Iran
All Human Rights for All in Iran
Association for the Human Rights of the Azerbaijani people in Iran (AHRAZ)
Baloch Activists Campaign
Balochistan Human Rights Group
Center for Human Rights in Iran CHRI)
Chilean PEN Center
Coalition For Women In Journalism
Croatian PEN
Danish PEN
ECPM (Together against the death penalty)
English PEN
Femena
Freedom House
Free Nazanin Campaign
Front Line Defenders
International Federation for Human Rights (FIDH)
Iran Human Rights
Iran Justice
Irish PEN/PEN na hÉireann
HÁWAR.help
Kurdistan Human Rights Association-Geneva (KMMK-G)
Kurdistan Human Rights Network
Kurdpa Human Rights Organization
League for the Defence of Human Rights in Iran (LDDHI)
Middle East Matters
Narges Foundation
PEN America
PEN Austria
PEN Canada
PEN Català
PEN Flanders Belgium
PEN International
PEN Melbourne
PEN Netherlands
PEN Norway
PEN Sweden
PEN Sydney
Raoul Wallenberg Centre for Human Rights
Reporters Sans Frontières
San Miguel PEN
Shirin Ebadi, 2003 Nobel Peace Prize Laureate
United for Iran
World Organisation Against Torture (OMCT)