Iranian civil and political activists against the "solitary cell" punishment

On Monday, March 1, a group of political and civil activists gathered at the Judicial Services Office in Tehran to file a complaint against the use of solitary confinement against detainees and prisoners. These political activists consider the imposition of solitary confinement on detainees and prisoners to be a clear example of a violation of international law and a clear sign of torture of prisoners. 

The practice of pressuring prisoners by holding them in solitary confinement for long periods of time has long been prevalent in the Islamic Republic of Iran's judicial system. This form of punishment is typically used during the interrogation phase of detainees with the aim of exerting psychological pressure on them to obtain information and coerce false confessions against those arrested and detained.

The joint petition of civil activists and former political prisoners states, "According to domestic and international regulations, keeping the accused in solitary confinement is against legal regulations and the Constitution of the Islamic Republic, and is a clear example of torture and crimes under Articles 570 and 579 of the Islamic Penal Code. Therefore, it demands the prosecution of all the commanders, agents, and officials who issued the order to keep them in solitary confinement."

According to these civil activists, "Despite civil and human rights protests to stop holding defendants in solitary confinement, this practice continues, even though holding defendants in solitary confinement is not provided for in any legal regulation."

Among those present in front of the judicial office were figures such as Narges Mohammadi, Farangis Mazloum, Zia Nabavi, Hamid Asafi. Ahmadreza Haeri, Kourosh Zaeem, Ashkan Razavi. Siavash Hatem, Majid Musafer, Milad Fadaei, Jila Bani Yaqoub, Bahman Ahmadi Amouie, Majid Musafer, Farshad Ghorbanpour, Rasoul Badaghi, Marzieh Rasouli, Mohammad Karimi, Ebrahimullah Bakhshi, Arash Kaykhosravi, Akbar Amini Aramaki, Zahra Tohidi, Alireza Khoshbakht, and Faezeh Hashemi. And a number of others, including Jafar Panahi, Khosrowseif, Mohammad Ali Amouie, Mahmoud Beheshti, and Saeed Madani, registered their petitions in other offices through their lawyers.

 There is no law in Iran that imposes solitary confinement.

There is no law or regulation in Iran’s current laws that imposes solitary confinement on prisoners; Article 524 of the Iranian Code of Criminal Procedure does not recognize solitary confinement for convicts. Article 524 of the Iranian Code of Criminal Procedure (2015 edition) states: “In the event of a disciplinary violation by a prisoner, one of the following punishments shall be determined by the Disciplinary Council, taking into account proportionality, and shall be implemented after approval by the executing judge: a) Transfer from vocational training and employment centers to a closed or semi-open prison b) Deprivation of visits for a maximum of three times c) Deprivation of leave for a maximum of three months d) Deprivation of the offer of pardon and conditional release for a maximum of six months.

On the other hand, there is no legal authorization in Iran to impose solitary confinement; in January 2003, the country's Administrative Court of Justice declared Article 169, Section 4, of the Executive Regulations of the Iranian Prisons Organization, which states that "implementing solitary confinement for up to one month as a disciplinary punishment for a prisoner" to be illegal and invalidated it.

The decision of the country's Administrative Court of Justice to declare solitary confinement an unlawful punishment was made based on Article 36 of the Iranian Constitution, which states that "the sentence and its execution must be issued only by a competent court and in accordance with the law."

Article 39 of the Iranian Constitution also states that "insulting the dignity and honor of anyone who has been arrested, detained, imprisoned, or exiled by law, in any form, is prohibited and punishable."

According to Article 579 of the Islamic Penal Code, if any government official punishes a convicted person more severely than the sentence imposed or punishes a person who has not been sentenced, he or she will be sentenced to imprisonment for six months to three years.

The Supreme Administrative Court of the country's ruling on the annulment of Article 169, Paragraph 4 of the Executive Regulations of the Prisons Organization states, "Considering that the legislature has not enacted a provision regarding solitary confinement, and its implementation, which deprives the prisoner of meetings and conversations with other prisoners and causes mental anguish and unbearable consequences, is a clear example of the severity of the practice in the manner and quality of the implementation of the prison sentence, Article 169, Paragraph 4 of the Executive Regulations of the Prisons Organization, which imposes solitary confinement for up to one month as a disciplinary punishment for an individual prisoner, is deemed to be unlawful and outside the limits of authority stipulated in Article 9 of the Law on the Transformation of the Council of Supervisors of Prisons and Security and Educational Measures of the Country into the Organization of Prisons and Security and Educational Measures of the Country, approved in 2017, and is annulled pursuant to Part 2 of Article 25 of the Law of the Court of Administrative Justice."

According to a lawyer in Iran, "any judicial order to transfer a prisoner to solitary confinement is arbitrary and illegal."

In addition, the imposition of solitary confinement is a clear violation of Articles 1, 6, 7, and 9 of the Law on “Respect for Legitimate Freedoms and Protection of Citizens’ Rights,” a law that was passed by the Islamic Consultative Assembly in 2004. The punishment of solitary confinement is also an example of torture of convicts, as referred to in Articles 570 and 579 of the Islamic Penal Code.

On the other hand, Article 9 of the Iranian Civil Code considers international treaties signed by Iran to be as valid as domestic laws. Accordingly, and since Iran is a signatory to the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, the Islamic Republic is obligated to be bound by this international covenant; Article 7 of this international covenant states that “No one shall be subjected to torture or to cruel, inhuman or degrading punishment.”

Previously, in 2009, Hashemi Shahroudi, the former head of the judiciary, had said in an interview that solitary confinement was a violation of the laws of the Islamic Republic of Iran.

Solitary confinement: A tactic used by the Revolutionary Guards and the Ministry of Intelligence to interrogate and force detainees to confess

In recent years, the practice of imposing solitary confinement has become very common among the security institutions of the Islamic Republic of Iran; the IRGC Intelligence Organization, as a security institution independent of the government and close to the Leader of the Islamic Republic of Iran, on the one hand, and the Ministry of Intelligence of the government of Hassan Rouhani on the other.

These two security agencies have exclusive control over designated sections of the prisons. Physical and psychological pressure and solitary confinement are imposed on prisoners in the sections under the control of the security agencies without any supervision, and these security agencies are never held accountable for their illegal behavior.

In most cases where individuals (generally civil society activists and human rights defenders) face national security charges, the judicial authorities of the Islamic Republic of Iran act under the orders of security agencies, and in a sense call themselves “security judges.” Judges who in some cases have unlimited powers and in others cause the detainee to be held in solitary confinement for more than a year. These judges are in fact accountable only to superiors within the security apparatus and rarely adhere to the laws and regulations enacted by the country.

The punishment of solitary confinement is imposed on prisoners in most cases during the interrogation and investigation phase. Documentation and a long history of judicial authorities show that torture of detainees and forcing them to make false confessions has occurred during the period of solitary confinement. Forced confessions are usually broadcast by official Iranian media such as television in order to violate the dignity and honor of the detainees and use these confessions as documentation and evidence to convict the detainees.

In some cases, despite protests from prisoners' lawyers, judicial authorities have transferred detainees from general wards to solitary confinement for ongoing interrogations.

Solitary confinement is usually reserved for political opponents, prisoners of conscience, and civil society activists. In recent years, however, it has also been used against people arrested in connection with financial cases. In addition, solitary confinement in police stations has been used for years against people involved in violent crimes such as murder or armed robbery.

According to many legal experts in Iran, the lack of public awareness and sensitivity towards such measures facilitates the widespread use of solitary confinement as a punishment for detainees.

According to legal experts in Iran, at the same time as civil activists filed a recent complaint about solitary confinement in the judiciary,

Taking this complaint to the Article 90 Commission of the Islamic Consultative Assembly and following it up in the executive bodies of the legislative and judicial branches, as well as following it up by the President of the country as the person responsible for implementing the Constitution, can help in making this joint petition of social and civil activists in Iran effective and reaching a conclusion.

In 2017, Narges Mohammadi, a human rights activist who was imprisoned at the time, wrote an open letter to the Article 90 Commission of the Islamic Consultative Assembly, calling for the formation of a committee to investigate the legal and security aspects of the phenomenon of “solitary confinement” in Iranian prisons and calling for an end to the practice of using solitary confinement against prisoners. Narges Mohammadi’s letter states in part, “Keeping defendants in solitary confinement, based on the laws and regulations of the Islamic Republic of Iran (based on the decision of the General Board of the Administrative Court of Justice), is illegal and a clear violation of the principles enshrined in the Constitution and an attack on the rights and dignity of prisoners.”

Source: Iran Human Rights Campaign