A Kurdish political prisoner named Barzan Mohammadi was released from Marivan prison after 15 months of imprisonment on 13 August.
The Intelligence Organisation of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) arrested the Kurdish civil rights activist on 7 June 2021 in the Goshkhani village of Sarvabad, Kurdistan province.
A day after his arrest, Mohammadi was transferred to Marivan Prison.
The activist’s court hearing was held online in Marivan prison after several months of detention.
The Islamic Revolutionary Court of Marivan sentenced him to 15 months and one day in prison on the charge of “insulting the leader of the Islamic Republic of Iran” and seven months and 16 days in prison on the charges of “insulting the state”.
With the application of the Law on Consolidation of Sentences (Article 134), his final sentence became 15 months and one-day imprisonment.
Mohammadi, a 41-year-old civilian from Sarvabad and a resident of Tehran, was arrested by plainclothes on 2 August 2018 at the Valiasr crossroad in Tehran, during a protest rally held against the economic situation in the country.
He was interrogated for ten days in one of Tehran’s security detention centres and then transferred to the Greater Tehran Central Penitentiary.
In October 2018, Branch 15 of the Islamic Revolution Court of Tehran, presided over by Judge Salavati, sentenced him to six years in prison on charges of “gathering and collusion with the intention of acting against national security” and “propaganda against the state”.
After the objection of his lawyer, Mohammadi’s case was referred to the Court of Appeals in Tehran. In February 2019, his sentence was reduced to three years and six months.
After the verdict was finalised, the political prisoner, along with another political prisoner Ali Reza Shir-Mohammadi, were transferred to the Greater Tehran Central Penitentiary.
Later, the two political prisoners went on a strike to protest against the non-compliance of the prison authorities with the principle of segregation of prisoners.
Shir-Mohammadi was murdered by two other prisoners in this prison on 10 June 2019. Barzan Mohammadi, being a witness to the murder, published an open letter in this regard.
