Iranian activist Narges Mohammadi, Nobel Peace Prize winner in 2023, began a hunger strike in prison. The activist protests against the lack of medical care in prisons and the mandatory use of the Islamic veil in the country.
“Narges Mohammadi informed his family, through a message, that he had started a hunger strike. We are concerned about his state of health,” the activist’s family said in a statement, cited by AFP.
Narges Mohammadi, 51, has been detained in Evin Prison in Tehran since 2021 and suffers from health problems.
Mohammadi began the hunger strike to denounce “the Islamic Republic’s policy of delaying and neglecting medical care for sick prisoners.”
This lack of medical care translates into “loss of health and lives,” according to the statement released by Mohammadi’s family.
The activist also wants to denounce the “death policy of Iranian women who do not wear veils.”
The family claimed that Mohammadi needs “urgent medical attention” at a center specialized in lungs and heart, something that the authorities of the Persian country refuse.
On Thursday, Mohammadi’s family reported that prison authorities refused to transfer Narges to the hospital. His relatives warned that, according to an electrocardiogram performed in prison, the Iranian activist needed urgent hospitalization.
“A prison official gave orders that she should not be transferred to the hospital ‘under any circumstances’ if she was not covered with a veil,” the activist’s family later denounced, who, this Monday, stated that they hold the Islam Republic responsible for what happened to Narges Mohmmadi.
The Norwegian Nobel Committee last month awarded the prestigious prize to Mohammadi “for her fight against the oppression of women in Iran and the promotion of human rights and freedom for all.”
The Nobel Foundation linked Mohammadi’s activism with the protests that broke out last year in Iran, after the death, in police custody, of the young Mahsa Amini, arrested for not wearing the Islamic veil correctly.
The Iranian Government considered the awarding of the prize to the activist as “a political act” and a measure of “pressure” from the West.
Mohammadi is currently serving a 10-year prison sentence for “spreading anti-state propaganda,” but has been in and out of several Iranian prisons in recent years.
His activism cost him 13 arrests, five sentences totaling 31 years in prison and 154 lashes.
The journalist and activist has not seen her children, who are in Paris, for eight years and they spend long periods in solitary confinement.
Source: TSF
