Iran: Family Under Repeated Attack For Seeking Justice

On 10 November, state media close to Iran’s security and intelligence apparatus disseminated propaganda articles claiming that Elham Afkari was detained at the border of Iran while showing a photograph of her blindfolded in custody. According to information gathered by Amnesty International, she was arrested that same day in Shiraz, located in south-central Iran, while out with her family. The articles also falsely claimed that she was one of the “key agents” inside the country, working on behalf of Iran International, a Persian language news channel based outside of the country, which Iran’s Minister of Intelligence has labelled a “terrorist organization”, and also accused her of encouraging women and girls to participate in the ongoing popular uprising. On 22 November 2022, the spokesperson of judiciary stated that Elham Afkari was accused of “gathering and colluding to commit crimes against national security” through “assisting the calls of the opponents [of the Islamic Republic system]” in the context of the ongoing popular uprising. A conviction on this charge carries up to five years in prison. Elham Afkari’s family denies all these accusations, which would fall within the scope of the peaceful exercise of human rights. Elham Afkari’s husband and three-year-old child were released later the same day on 10 November 2022, though Ministry of Intelligence agents denied Elham Afkari all information about her child for two days, causing her great mental distress as she believed her child could still be in detention. 

The three brothers were convicted of politically-motivated charges for their peaceful participation in protests. Vahid Afkari and Navid Afkari were also convicted of a baseless accusation involving murder of a security official. The authorities unjustly sentenced Navid Afkari to death, and Habib Afkari and Vahid Afkari to prison terms and 74 lashes each. Following extensive review of court documents and other legal documents pertaining to Vahid Afkari and Habib Afkari’s cases, Amnesty International concluded that their convictions and sentences are flagrantly unjust and amount to a miscarriage of justice. See here. In June 2022, the UN Working Group on Arbitrary Detention held that “that the deprivation of liberty of Vahid [Afkari] and Habib Afkari lacks legal basis and is thus arbitrary…[and] the breaches of the fair trial and due process rights… are of such gravity as to give their deprivation of liberty an arbitrary character” and called for their immediate unconditional release and for them to be accorded reparations in accordance with international law. Vahid Afkari reported in written complaints and in court that between his arrest in September 2018 and the May 2019 completion of the investigation stage, he was repeatedly tortured to “confess”. He said he was held in prolonged solitary confinement, repeatedly punched, kicked, and beaten with sticks and cables while blindfolded, and psychologically tortured, including through death threats and threats to imprison, kill, sexually assault or otherwise harm his family members, including his sister. Vahid Afkari attempted suicide on 26 October 2018 and 2 April 2019; both times authorities failed to provide him with adequate healthcare. His repeated requests for his allegations of torture to be investigated were dismissed and ignored.

Amnesty International has previously documented how Iranian authorities systematically target families seeking truth and justice for the unlawful killings of their loved ones. Relatives seeking truth and justice and witnesses from the November 2019 protests who testified at hearings of the International People’s Tribunal on Iran’s Atrocities in London held between November 2021 and February 2022 faced reprisals from the Iranian authorities, including arbitrary arrest and detention, violence, unjust prosecution, summoning for coercive interrogations, death threats, and other forms of harassment. Amnesty International has also previously documented how the authorities were attempting to coerce the Afkari family into silence through repeated harassment, threats and prosecution, and restricted their rights to hold memorial ceremonies. They also subjected Navid Afkari’s burial site to desecration and destruction. On 13 November 2022, Hamid Afkari, another brother, was arbitrarily detained for less than 24 hours when he inquired about his sister. Prior to this, on 12 September 2021, another brother, Saeed Afkari, who has also publicly called for accountability for his brothers, was arbitrarily arrested in Shiraz and released after hours of intense interrogations. 

Iran has been rocked by an unprecedented popular uprising against the Islamic Republic system since the death in custody of Mahsa (Zhina) Amini following her arrest by Iran’s “morality” police on 16 September 2022. Security forces have responded with unlawful force, including lethal force, killing hundreds of men, women and children and injuring thousands of others. According to a report by Radio Farda on the hacked files of state media outlet Fars News, the authorities have arbitrarily arrested over 29,000 people as of late October 2022 in the context of the popular uprising. Those arrested include protesters, journalists, human rights defenders, dissidents, university students and schoolchildren, and many have been subjected to enforced disappearance, incommunicado detention, torture and other ill-treatment, and unfair trials, including for offences carrying the death penalty.