2012 Sakharov Prize Winner
Nasrin Sotoudeh's Hunger
Strike
By Alex P. Vidal
LOS ANGELES,
California – Department Spokesperson Victoria Nuland of the Office of the
Spokesperson, Department of State, has issued a statement November 30, 2012:
“We are
deeply troubled by reports of the rapidly declining health of jailed Iranian
human rights defender and 2012 Sakharov Prize winner Nasrin Sotoudeh. Iranian
officials have denied Sotoudeh, a leading women’s rights champion, medical care
during her more than six-week hunger strike and have kept her in solitary
confinement.
“We remain
concerned for Sotoudeh’s well-being given Iran’s history of withholding
treatment from prisoners and allowing them to die from hunger strikes.
“We demand
the Iranian Government cease its intolerable mistreatment of Sotoudeh and
immediately release her and the more than 30 other female political prisoners
detained in Evin Prison.”
DISPUTE
Sotoudeh has
represented imprisoned Iranian opposition activists and politicians following
the disputed June 2009 Iranian presidential elections as well as prisoners
sentenced to death for crimes committed when they were minors. Her clients have
included journalist Isa Saharkhiz, Nobel Peace Prize laureate Shirin Ebadi, and
Heshmat Tabarzadi, the head of the banned opposition group Democratic Front of
Iran.
Sotoudeh was
arrested in September 2010 on charges of spreading propaganda and conspiring to
harm state security and was imprisoned in solitary confinement in Evin Prison.
In January 2011, Iranian authorities sentenced Sotoudeh to 11 years in prison,
in addition to barring her from practicing law and from leaving the country for
20 years.
An appeals
court later reduced Sotoudeh's prison sentence to six years, and her ban from
working as a lawyer to ten years.
No comments:
Post a Comment