UN Calls for ‘Immediate’ Release of Zeinab Jalalian, Kurdish Political Activist

The UN Working Group on Arbitrary Detention has called on the Islamic Republic of Iran to “immediately” release Zeinab Jalalian, a Kurdish political activist and the only female political prisoner sentenced to life imprisonment.

According to a report by Justice for Iran organization, in this statement the Iranian government has been obliged to prosecute officials responsible for violating the rights of this Kurdish political activist.

Zeinab Jalalian was arrested on March 11, 2008, on charges of cooperating with the Kurdistan Free Life Party (PJAK).

Human rights organizations say that Ms. Jalalian has been in detention without leave for the past eight years and has “lost her health due to torture and prison conditions.”

According to a report by human rights organizations, “Zeinab Jalalian contracted trachoma during her imprisonment and now faces blindness due to the loss of vision in both eyes. She has also contracted severe intestinal infections and internal bleeding during her years of detention and requires immediate and specialized medical treatment. Despite the family’s announcement of their readiness to bear the costs of her treatment, security officials have not agreed to transfer her outside the prison for medical treatment, and in their latest action in March 2016, they conditioned her hospital transfer on holding one of her young family members as a hostage.”

The UN Working Group on Arbitrary Detention, considering the risk of irreparable damage to Zeinab Jalalian’s physical health, has deemed “appropriate reparation for this case as her immediate release and the restoration of all damages inflicted” on Zeinab Jalalian.

The UN Working Group on Arbitrary Detention is a subsidiary body of the UN Human Rights Council. Five independent experts of this body, after investigating arbitrary detentions, have expressed their views to governments and demand their accountability.

The UN Working Group on Arbitrary Detention has so far ruled on a small number of cases related to Iran as unlawful detention and imprisonment, including the cases of Mir-Hossein Mousavi, Mehdi Karrubi and Zahra Rahnavard, leaders of protest movements after the 2009 elections in Iran, and Abdolfattah Soltani and Nasrin Sotoudeh, lawyers.ِ

Source: BBC