Iranian Nobel Peace Prize winner Narges Mohammadi was taken to hospital after being beaten when she was arrested last week, her family says.
The 53-year-old human rights activist told them in a phone call on Sunday that she was taken to the emergency room twice after being “attacked by plainclothes officers with strong and repeated blows with batons to the head and neck,” according to the Narges Foundation.
There was no comment from Iranian authorities, but they said she was detained for making “provocative comments” at a memorial ceremony in the city of Mashhad on Friday.
The Nobel Committee and award-winning filmmaker Jafar Panahi are among those calling for his release.
Mohammadi, vice president of the Center for Human Rights Defenders in Iran, received the 2023 Nobel Peace Prize for her activism against female oppression in Iran and the promotion of human rights.
He has spent more than 10 years of his life in prison. Since 2021, she has been serving a 13-year sentence accused of committing “propaganda activities against the State” and “collusion against State security”, which she denied.
In December 2024, he was granted temporary release from the notorious Evin prison in Tehran for medical reasons.
He has continued campaigning while undergoing treatment.
On Friday he gave a speech at a memorial ceremony in Mashhad for Khosrow Alikordi, a human rights activist and lawyer who was found dead earlier this month in what human rights groups described as “suspicious” circumstances.
According to the Narges Foundation, eyewitnesses cited by Mohammadi’s family said she was attacked by about 15 plainclothes officers at the monument, and that some were seen pulling her hair and hitting her with clubs and batons.
On Sunday afternoon, Mohammadi made a brief phone call to her family and told them that “the intensity of the beating was so strong, so strong and so repeated that she was taken to the hospital emergency room twice,” according to a statement.
“She stressed that she does not even know which security authority is currently detaining her and that no explanation has been given to her. Her physical condition at the time of the call was not good and she seemed ill,” he added.
The Narges Foundation quoted Ms Mohammadi as saying that she was accused of “cooperating with the Israeli government” and that she had been threatened with death, telling her: “We are going to put your mother in mourning.”
The statement claims that two other activists detained at the memorial ceremony, Sepideh Gholian and Pouran Nazemi, were also beaten by plainclothes officers.
Mashhad prosecutor Hasan Hematifar told reporters on Saturday that Mohammadi was among 39 people arrested.
She said she and Khosrow Alikordi’s brother Javad had encouraged those present to “chant rules-breaking slogans” and “disturb the peace.”
The Norwegian Nobel Committee said Friday it was deeply concerned by what it called Mohammadi’s “brutal arrest” and called on Iranian authorities to “guarantee her safety and integrity and release her unconditionally.”
Jafar Panahi, fellow filmmaker Mohammad Rasoulof and more than a dozen other activists said in a joint statement that what happened at Alikordi’s memorial ceremony “was a clear reflection of the worrying state of freedom and security and, consequently, the inefficiency and lack of accountability of the authorities in today’s Iran.”
