Sunday, July 14, 2019

NEWS))))))



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The Iranian opposition coalition National Council of Resistance of Iran (NCRI) held its annual “Free Iran” conference on Saturday in Albania or Ashraf 3, home to members of the People’s Mojahedin Organization of Iran (PMOI/MEK). Ashraf 3 is located in Tirana, the capital of Albania, where PMOI/MEK members were relocated to from Iraq back in 2016. In this conference, tens of political personalities, experts, and law makers of different countries attended. The key note speaker was Maryam Rajavi the president elect of the Iranian resistance, National Council of Resistance of Iran. Including among others, former Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper and former foreigner Minister John Baird attended the conference. Honorable Stephen Harper spoke and supported Maryam Rajavia's 10 piont plan for a free Iran.

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On the eve of the five-day annual gatherings of the Iranian Resistance which were held this year in Albania, the Iranian regime’s Ministry of Intelligence and Security (MOIS) has summoned or arrested scores of families and supporters of the People’s Mojahedin Organization of Iran (PMOI/MEK) in Tehran and other cities. They include former political prisoner Sedigheh Moradi and her husband. A number of those arrested were former political prisoners and served time in the 80s and 90s. Former political prisoner Sedigheh Moradi, 57, has a 20-year-old daughter. She was arrested in April 2011, and interrogated and tortured seven months in Ward 209 of the Evin Prison. Her torturers tried to force her into making false confessions against herself on the state television. Her eyes suffered damages and her vision deteriorated as a result of these tortures. In July of 2012, Sedigheh Moradi was transferred to the Qarchak Prison in Varamin and spent several months in inhuman conditions and among dangerous convicts. Soon after, prison authorities were alarmed by her positive impact on ordinary prisoners and isolated her from them. Ms. Moradi suffered a meniscus tear and tendon injury while in detention. She also suffered from stomachache, jaw pain, toothache, neck arthritis and sciatica. She needed to see doctors outside the prison but prison authorities did not give her leave to receive medical care. She was freed on November 23, 2016, upon the ruling of the Revision Court of Tehran. Sedigheh had been imprisoned twice before in the 1980s. She is a survivor of the massacre of political prisoners in 1988. In November 2016, she sent out a letter from prison and called for the prosecution of the perpetrators of the massacre. She wrote in part, “In 1981, I was arrested for supporting the People’s Mojahedin Organization of Iran. During that time, I witnessed how they took away some of the prisoners from my side and sent them before the firing squads. At nights, we counted the coups de grace. I was arrested again in 1985. In 1988, I witnessed the massacre of prisoners from July to September…. I witnessed the executions of those who had finished serving their sentences. They executed a prisoner who was mentally deranged.”

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On Wednesday, July 10, Ms. Raheleh Ahmadi was arrested at her home by Iranian regime's agents and transferred to Qarchak Prison. Raheleh was arrested on charges of “propaganda against the regime”, “cooperating with opposing media” and “encouraging and provoking corruption and prostitution” on Thursday, July 11, 2019. She was taken to an unknown location after being transferred to the quarantine of Qarchak prison in Varamin.
Raheleh Ahmadi is the mother of civil activist Saba Kord Afshari who was arrested on June 1, 2019 and is detained in the quarantine section of the Qarchak prison in Varamin. On July 2, she was again transferred from Qarchak prison in Varamin to an unknown location.
Saba Kord Afshari was arrested during the protests in Tehran in early August 2018 and was transferred to Qarchak Prison in Varamin.

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Fatemeh Mohammadi, a former political prisoner was beaten by a female Guidance Patrol officer in Tehran-Iran on Tuesday, July 9, 2019, and subsequently arrested by the Law Enforcement agents. Mousavi a female Guidance Patrol agent harassed Fatemeh Mohammadi and several other women on the pretext of enforcing the hijab on the bus. According to Fatemeh Mohammadi, she was beaten by the female agent in the Baharestan area, in Tehran, and her face was injured. When Ms. Mohammadi approached the 119 Police Station to complain about the incident, instead of receiving a response to her complaint, she was arrested.

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On Monday, July 8, an interrogation session and the final defense of Neda Naji was held at the Prosecutor’s Office of Evin Prison in Iran. Ms. Naji’s arrest has been extended for another month. The lives of Neda Naji and Atefeh Rangriz, female labor activists arrested during the Labor Day demonstration in Tehran, are in danger.



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On Monday, July 8, four Christian women were arrested in Bushehr-Iran on charges of their beliefs by agents of the Ministry of Intelligence. Maryam Fallahi, 35, Marjan Fallahi, 33, Khatoun Fathollahzadeh, 61, and Fatemeh Talebi, 27, were arrested along with their husbands. The Ministry of Intelligence agents inspected all the houses of these four Christian women in front of their children. They confiscated Christian books and pamphlets, Christian symbols including wooden crosses, drawings and signs, several laptops, mobiles and identification cards and bank credit cards. Khatoun Fathollahzadeh was temporarily released on the first day of her arrest due to her age. The remaining members of her family are detained in solitary confinement at the headquarters of the Ministry of Intelligence Office in Bushehr without access to a lawyer. In another news regarding religious minorities in Iran, the Birjand sharia court sentenced 9 Baha’i citizens to 54 years in prison. There are four Baha’i women among these prisoners. The names of these four Baha’i women include Maryam Mokhtari, Rafat Talebi Fard, Shaida Abedi, and Simin Mohammadi. They each have been sentenced to 6 years’ imprisonment.