A total of 12 Kurdish female artists and activists are among dozens of people detained and summoned by Iranian security forces in the Kurdish region of the country since 9 January.
The new wave of arrests of Kurdish civilians and activists saw more than 100 people arrested since its launch more than a month ago.
Six female activists Darya Talebani, Asrin Mohammadi, Azimeh Naseri, Rozhin Mohammadpour, Fariba Ahmadi, and Roya Jalali, who were detained in this period, still remain in custody.
Separately, five members of Gelaris music group Elham Yazdanipour, Samira Farahnaki, Nastaran Yazdanipour, Nazanin Atabaki, and Maliheh Moradi were summoned during the past month to both the morality police department and the courthouse of Kermanshah.
Arezoo Mostafaei, a 17-year-old poet, was also summoned to the intelligence office of Marivan as part of the detentions. She reportedly spent three days in the detention centre of this security institution under difficult conditions.
The artists were interrogated and then released on bail.
Although families of detainees have been threatened by security institutions for not spreading information regarding the detention status of their family members, a number of these families, who did not want their names to be revealed, told the Kurdistan Human Rights Network (KHRN) that they were concerned about the fate of the detainees, demanding public opinion and human rights organisations to struggle and press for the release of the activists.
The KHRN has been informed through sources close to the families of detainees that activist Azimeh Naseri – arrested in Bukan on 9 January – has been taken to the women’s ward of Orumiyeh Central Prison on 3 February, after completion of her interrogation. She has been reportedly charged with “collaboration with one of the Kurdish opposition parties”.
Asrin Mohammadi and Darya Talebani, two female activists from Sanandaj and Mahabad were arrested by forces of the Intelligence Organisation of the IRGC in Tehran and Mahabad on 9 January. They are still being interrogated in the detention centre of the IRGC’s Al-Mahdi base in Orumiyeh. The two Kurdish activists have only been able to make one brief phone call to their families since their arrest. Despite their families’ follow-ups, no information has, so far, been obtained about their situation.
Rozhin Mohammadi and Fariba Ahmadi, who were arrested by forces of the Ministry of Intelligence in Bukan on 19 January and transferred to the detention centre of the intelligence office in Orumiyeh, are still being interrogated without the right to having phone calls with or visits by their families.
There is also no information about Roya Jalali, an environmental activist and member of the Green Society of Kurdistan, who was arrested by forces of the intelligence office of Sanandaj on 2 February. According to Jalali’s acquaintances, she suffers from MS, but has been denied of her right to receive medicine. She is also not allowed to contact her family, they said.
