TEHRAN, 18 January 2005 — Iranian Nobel Peace Prize winner Shirin Ebadi yesterday mounted a fresh challenge to the Islamic republic’s hard-line judiciary by parading dissidents who she said were seriously abused and tortured in jail. Ebadi, accompanied by a group of prominent regime critics, told reporters that detainees were still being subjected to long periods of solitary confinement and other psychological pressures despite an apparent official order for the practice to stop.
“Solitary confinement cells are white torture. Is it fair that they treat murderers in a softer way than those who say ‘long live democracy’?” asked Ebadi. “Why do they treat political prisoners worse than normal prisoners? Is seeking freedom a big crime?” Ebadi said, demanding to know why a call from judiciary chief Ayatollah Mahmoud Hashemi Shahroudi for solitary cells to be closed six months ago had not been enforced.
A group of some 10 dissidents, including journalists, political activists and students, took part in the news conference at the offices of Ebadi’s Human Rights Defenders’ Circle. Several of them recounted their experiences, describing long stretches of solitary confinement and claiming psychological pressure was used to extract confessions.
Ebadi, who last week refused to obey a summons from Iran’s feared Revolutionary Court, said: “I am calling on judiciary officials to issue a stern order banning the use of solitary confinement.” Speaking at a rare conference during which a number of former prisoners recounted their experiences in solitary confinement, Ebadi said it was a tool of unpopular governments. “Why should the ones who say ‘long live democracy’ be tortured?... Is seeking democracy and freedom a crime?”
Ebadi, a 57-year-old human rights lawyer, spent 25 days in solitary confinement in 2000 as a result of one of her cases - an experience which she said caused a childhood speech defect to resurface. The youngest speaker at the gathering was journalist Hanif Mazroui, 26, one of 23 journalists and Internet technicians jailed during a crackdown on liberal websites late last year. “I always thought these sort of things didn’t happen in our country any more,” said Mazroui, who spent 60 days in solitary confinement.
Another political dissident, Ezzatollah Sahabi, claimed that after his arrest several years ago he was given narcotics in jail, put in solitary confinement for 441 days, and told that his wife and son could be arrested. “After a while they managed to get me to admit to treason, having relations with foreign governments,” he said. His jailers “dictated a letter of repentance” that was printed in the hard-line Kayhan newspaper, he added.
Last week, the judiciary denied such allegations and threatened legal action against those alleging that recently detained journalists and Internet writers were abused to extract confession letters. Ebadi’s public challenge to the judiciary, a right-wing bastion of the clerical regime, came just days after she received an order to appear before a court that handles crimes against national security to explain her activities or face arrest.
“The summons was illegal and I did not want to comply with an illegal request by going to the court,” Ebadi told reporters, reiterating that she would not do so as long as the charges against her were unspecified.
Amid international criticism, Iranian authorities on Sunday sought to play down the summons, insisting Ebadi was the subject only of a “private complaint” and was at worst facing a fine of up to 500,000 rials ($57).
Ebadi argued that “private cases should be first dealt with in public courts and these courts refer them to the police for local investigation, and not to a judicial branch that deals with political and security issues.”
