Nasrin Sotoudeh from Evin Prison: Solitary Confinement is Psychological, Mental and Inhuman Torture

This is the opening of an open letter from Nasrin Sotoudeh, a renowned human rights activist, addressed to the International PEN Club. Following a ruling by Branch 15 of the Tehran Islamic Revolutionary Court under the presidency of Judge Abolqasem Salawati, and after consolidating her sentences, she has been sentenced to 10 years in prison. She is currently serving her previous five-year sentence.

• I am writing this letter from the women’s ward of Evin Prison. Among the 25 imprisoned women, we are women of letters and thought with diverse ideological and political inclinations. There is not a single female terrorist or saboteur among us, and all of our charges stem from our political, civil, ideological activities and intellectual inclinations, for which we have been sentenced to endure lengthy prison terms. The combined sentences for us 23 women total 177 years (two have not yet received their sentences).

In this letter, Nasrin Sotoudeh addresses the consequences and illnesses that result from the experience of solitary confinement, referring to these experiences as “white torture.”

She protests against the detention conditions of political, civil and ideological activists in solitary confinement cells in Islamic Republic prisons.

The text of this letter was made available on Thursday, May 20, to the campaign supporting imprisoned mothers: “What prompted me to write to you, people of letters and thought, in the world, is to recount suffering and pain beyond the endurance of prison punishment. A prison where, unlike all other Iranian prisons, there are no telephones. Visits take place behind double-layered glass with a telephone, and we can only have in-person visits with first-degree family members once a month. Except for one visit per week, we have no contact with the outside world, and during the intervals between visits, we sink into complete silence and oblivion.”

This political prisoner describes the suffering and torture beyond prison as enduring solitary confinement in security wards: “We 25 women have collectively endured 150 months (more than 12 years) of detention in security wards, and this punishment is far more severe than prison punishment, which unfortunately defendants endure before trial and court proceedings during a period called preliminary investigations, and this period can last from one day to several years.”

In her letter, Nasrin Sotoudeh reports on the continued use of solitary confinement cells to pressure defendants. This comes as civil and human rights activists have consistently protested over recent years against the use of this violent method to extract confessions and admissions from defendants.

Based on what is stated in this letter, these very confessions form the basis for severe sentences issued against political and ideological defendants and civil activists: “But that is not the entire story, and the suffering does not end there. Many prisoners in solitary confinement lose their physical health and, worse, their mental health, often remaining afflicted with these conditions for the rest of their lives.”

This political prisoner has compared the space of solitary confinement cells to a sealed box where the defendant is left in a dark and obscure space, deprived of what is necessary for human perception and maintaining one’s identity: “Deprivation of air, sound, light and… as natural stimuli, to news, writing, reading and… as mental stimuli.”

Ms. Sotoudeh, who has experienced solitary confinement three times since 2001, has written that in 2010, following interrogations, she suffered consecutive nervous attacks in solitary confinement, whereas she had never experienced such problems before.

In concluding her letter, this political prisoner has called upon people of letters and thought who uphold human standards and defend freedom of expression to use the tools at their disposal to protest the use of solitary confinement as white torture, so that “perhaps one day we will witness the closing of solitary confinement cell doors to those whose only crime is thinking, criticism and reform.”