Evin Prison is a prison located in the Evin neighborhood of Tehran, Iran. The prison has been the primary site for the housing of Iran's political prisoners since 1972, before and after the Islamic Revolution, in a purpose-built wing nicknamed "Evin University" due to the number of intellectuals housed there. Evin Prison has been accused of committing "serious human rights abuses" against its political dissidents and critics of the government.
Ahmad Ahmadi, known as Pezeshk Ahmadi meaning Physician Ahmadi, was born in Mashhad to Mohammad Ali Ahmadi. He worked as a nurse at Qasr prison in Tehran, where he was ordered to kill political prisoners; he was later executed for these crimes.
Siamak Pourzand was an Iranian journalist and film critic. He was the manager of the Majmue-ye Farhangi-Honari-ye Tehran—a cultural center for writers, artists, and intellectuals—and wrote cultural commentary for several reformist newspapers later shut down by the Iranian government. In 2001, he was imprisoned for his articles critical of Iranian leadership, a move condemned by numerous human rights and journalism organizations.
One Million Signatures for the Repeal of Discriminatory Laws, also known as Change for Equality, is a campaign by women in Iran to collect one million signatures in support of changing discriminatory laws against women in their country.
Shadi Sadr is an Iranian lawyer, Human Rights advocate, essayist and journalist. She co-founded Justice for Iran (JFI) in 2010 and is currently the Executive Director of the NGO. She has published and lectured worldwide.
The "Iran After the Elections" Conference was a three-day social and cultural conference on reform in Iran organized by the Heinrich Böll Foundation and held in Berlin on April 7 and 8, 2000. The name refers to the Iranian legislative election, 2000. The conference was less notable for its proceedings than for its disruption by anti-regime Iranian exiles, and for the long prison sentences given to several participants upon their return to Iran.
Parvin Ardalan is a leading Iranian women's rights activist, writer and journalist. She was awarded the Olof Palme Prize in 2007 for her struggles for equal rights for men and women in Iran.
Iranian Women's Rights Movement, is based on the Iranian women's social movement for women's rights. This movement first emerged after the Iranian Constitutional Revolution in 1910, the year in which the first Women Journal was published by women. The movement lasted until 1933 in which the last women’s association was dissolved by the Reza Shah Pahlavi’s government. It heightened again after the Iranian Revolution (1979).
Jila Baniyaghoob is an Iranian journalist and women's rights activist. She is the editor-in-chief of the website Kanoon Zanan Irani. Baniyaghoob is married to fellow journalist Bahman Ahmadi Amou'i, an editor at Sarmayeh, a business newspaper.
Zeynab Jalalian is a Kurdish Iranian who has been convicted a mohareb and sentenced to death by an Islamic Revolutionary Court for allegedly being a member of the Kurdish militant group PJAK, which she denies. Jalalian's sentence was later reduced to life imprisonment.
Human rights organizations have condemned Jalalian's verdict, torture, conditions of incarceration and the inattention to her medical care.
The Mourning Mothers are a group of Iranian women whose spouses or children were killed by government agents in the protests following the disputed Iranian presidential election of 2009. The group also includes relatives of victims of earlier human rights abuses, including mass executions during the 1980s. The principal demand of the Mourning Mothers is government accountability for the deaths, arrests, and disappearances of their children. The mothers meet on Saturdays in Laleh Park in Tehran, and are often chased by the police and arrested.
Nasrin Sotoudeh is a human rights lawyer in Iran. She 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. She has also represented women arrested for appearing in public without a hijab, which is a punishable offence in Iran. Nasrin Sotoudeh was the subject of “Nasrin”, a documentary filmed in secret in Iran about Sotoudeh's "ongoing battles for the rights of women, children and minorities."
Kouhyar Goudarzi is an Iranian human rights activist, journalist and blogger who was imprisoned several times by the government of Iran. He previously served as an editor of Radio Zamane. He is a member of Committee of Human Rights Reporters (CHRR), serving as the head from 2005-2009.
Fadhila Mubarak is a Bahraini democracy activist. On 18 May 2011, she became the first female activist to be convicted for a role in the Bahraini uprising, and was named a prisoner of conscience by Amnesty International.
Narges Mohammadi is an Iranian human rights activist and the vice president of the Defenders of Human Rights Center, headed by Nobel Peace Prize laureate Shirin Ebadi. In May 2016, she was sentenced in Tehran to 16 years' imprisonment for establishing and running "a human rights movement that campaigns for the abolition of the death penalty".
Maryam Shafipour is an Iranian human rights activist. Following seven months of pre-trial detention in Evin Prison, including more than two months in solitary confinement, Shafipour was sentenced in March 2014 to seven years in prison for her political activities. Human rights organization have called for her release and condemned her conviction and prison sentence. She was released in July 2015.
Abolqasem Salavati is the head of the 15th branch of the Islamic Revolutionary Court in Tehran, Iran. In recent years, he has been the judge of numerous controversial cases. He is currently sanctioned by the United States and the European Union.
Atena Daemi is an Iranian civil rights activist, children's rights activist, human rights activist and political prisoner in Iran. Daemi was arrested on 21 October 2014 and sentenced as of 21 May 2015 to a fourteen-year prison sentence. Peaceful activities for which she was charged include distributing anti-death penalty leaflets and making posts on Facebook and Twitter criticising Iran's execution record. Later, Daemi and her sisters were arrested and sentenced on charges of having "insulted officers on duty". Subsequent appeals have overturned that conviction and reduced Daemi's original sentence.
Saba Kord Afshari is an Iranian political prisoner and She appeared without a head scarf, and talked about it on social media.
Khadijeh Afzal Vaziri was a women's rights activist, journalist and educator from Iran. She campaigned against the enforced wearing of the chador.
