Draft:Sexual harassment or rape of prisoners in Iran

Prisoner Rape in Iran examines the history of the prevalence of prisoner rape in Iran. Rape may be carried out to torture and psychologically destroy prisoners, or for other reasons. Given that sexual rape has a very destructive effect on the psyche of those who have been raped and also causes them to feel ashamed, few survivors of these cases have been willing to be interviewed by the media. At several points in the history of the Islamic Republic of Iran, the Islamic Republic of Iran has been accused of widespread sexual rape of political prisoners. During the execution of political prisoners in the 1950s, individuals such as Hossein Ali Montazeri, who was then the deputy leader of the Islamic Republic of Iran, protested in a letter against the rape of female prisoners. In what is known as the “bloggers’ case,” the defendants in the case reported being “threatened with rape” during their detention. During the presidency of Mahmoud Ahmadinejad and the implementation of the social security promotion plan by the police, individuals who were imprisoned in Kahrizak Detention Center spoke of rape, exposing their private parts, and urinating on prisoners. There have also been reports of torture and sexual abuse of detainees protesting the 10th presidential election. One of the candidates for the 2024 Iranian presidential election, Mehdi Karroubi, strongly demanded an investigation. In addition, the Iranian government has been accused of committing sexual rape in other sporadic cases, such as the case of Zahra Kazemi, in order to torture prisoners.

1950s

In the 1950s, following the establishment of guerrilla groups, mainly left-wing, in Iran, women political activists were imprisoned. The memoirs written by some of these women mention cases of rape with bottles and electric batons, intended to torture prisoners.

During the Islamic Republic

According to the UN Special Rapporteur on Human rights in Iran, in his report he criticized torture and sexual assault in Iranian prisons, as well as the organized repression of religious, ethnic and sexual minorities in the country.

Threats, harassment (sexual insults or touching the body, etc.) and sexual assault, including against prisoners of conscience and political prisoners, are among the methods of torture in the Islamic Republic of Iran.

Some women who were sexually assaulted in prison committed suicide after a while. In the prisons of the Islamic Republic, men were also raped to make them smaller; but according to some prisoners during the Pahlavi era, no men were raped.

Some testimonies mention the existence of places for rape in the prisons of the Islamic Republic.

Sexual slavery in prison

According to some political prisoners, (for example) a young man was raped seven times in one night and after he complained to prison officials, he was taken to solitary confinement. Sexual slavery is common in the prisons of the Islamic Republic of Iran, and some of the individuals involved sell their objects (sex slaves) to other prisoners.

Organization of rapes

Some testimonies from female prisoners mention the organized sexual assaults of ideological, political, and security prisoners.

Sexual harassment of LGBT protesters

More than 40 percent of LGBT people are sexually assaulted, and 20 percent of them were subjected to verbal, physical, and even sexual abuse and violence after seeking help from the police or judiciary.

1980s

Sa'idah Siyabi; she was arrested in 1981 with her four-month-old child and raped in prison. Azar Al-Kanaan (Nina Aghdam); a Kurdish political activist who was arrested in 1982 with her nine-month-old child at the age of 18 and raped in an Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps prison. Qane Mohammad Rezaee; she recounts being raped three times in an Islamic Republic prison in the 1980s.

After the end of the war until 2009

Reporters Without Borders considers sexual harassment of detainees to be a historical fact and believes that it was only after the publication of Mehdi Karroubi’s letter following the events following the 2009 Iranian presidential election that the issue was given official and widespread attention. For example, in what is known as the “bloggers’ case,” bloggers such as Omid Memarian, Roozbeh Mirebrahimi, and Shahram Rafizadeh reported being “threatened with rape” while in custody. Moeini also quotes Shirin Ebadi regarding the Zahra Kazemi case, who asks, “If Ms. Kazemi was hit in the head, why is there blood on a certain part of her clothes?” Saeed Emami was accused of serial murders and was suspiciously killed in prison. His wife was then subjected to verbal sexual abuse during interrogation, which was heard by members of parliament for the first time.

Rape victims

• Zahra Kazemi; She was an Iranian-Canadian journalist who was allegedly raped and then murdered after being arrested in Evin Prison for taking photographs and reporting on the incident.
• Zahra Bani Yaghoub; She was a doctor who was arrested in a park by the Hamedan Committee for the Promotion of Virtue and hanged in the detention center to make it look like a suicide. According to reports, she was raped in the detention center and was murdered for covering up the incident.
• Atefeh Rajabi Sahaleh; She was arrested several times by the Revolutionary Guards' Headquarters for the Promotion of Virtue and sentenced to flogging and imprisonment. In prison, she was raped by a 51-year-old former IRGC member. She was hanged in public by Judge Haji Rezaei (Head of the NEKA Judiciary) at the age of 16 and, according to neighbors, suffered from a mental disorder. His execution was the most controversial case of child execution in Iran.
• Matin Yar; In 2007, some prison officials repeatedly raped him in a brutal manner, causing physical harm, and threatened to kill him in a way that would make it look like suicide if he revealed anything.
• Masih Alinejad; When he went to Branch 1410 of the Civil Service Court to follow up on the complaint of the General Staff of the Armed Forces regarding his article in the Solidarity newspaper and to provide an explanation, the judge told him in front of his lawyer and deputy of the Solidarity newspaper that if he did not officially write and publish his apology in the newspaper, the Solidarity newspaper would have to make the headline the next day about a female journalist who had committed adultery with three men in one week. That journalist in question was Masih Alinejad himself.

Reactions

The Guardian Report

In its detailed report on the attack by security forces and Basij on a Tehran University dormitory, the Guardian mentioned sexual harassment in an interview with a student, quoting the student: “The police fired tear gas into the dormitories, beat us, broke windows and forced us to lie on the ground. I hadn’t even protested, but one of them jumped on me, sat on my back and beat me; then, pretending to be looking for a knife and a gun, he sexually abused me. They threatened to hang us and rape us.” In another report, the Guardian newspaper, citing Iranian blogs, spoke of the possibility of sexual harassment against detainees.

In a report from inside a women’s prison, the NGO and non-governmental organization Against Gender Apartheid (AG) mentioned a person named Tala who received sexual offers from her interrogator. This organization has named security wards 209 and 2-A of Evin Prison as dangerous wards for women, where women and girls accused of political and security crimes are constantly and routinely threatened with sexual assault; it has also been noted that recreating the rape scene for women accused in these security wards, which is outside the supervision of Evin Prison and the law, is as common as recreating the execution scene for men. The report continues by stating that touching the bodies of women and girls and describing their bodies in detail is a routine practice in security wards. The report mentions cases of sexual abuse or trafficking and rape or abuse of women prisoners in the prison’s women’s ward, by former heads of Rajayi-shahr Prison and Ward 350 of Evin. Reference is also made to ordinary female prisoners, and it is stated that they are being subjected to rape: "Prisoners who need leave, money, drugs, and even a place to live, and some of their crimes have been prostitution and drug use, have no choice but to submit to these conditions and relationships."

Kahrizak Detention Center

The Human Rights Activists in Iran Group has prepared a report on the conversations of prisoners in Kahrizak Detention Center. The report states that in the social security plan, prisoners are raped, exposed, and urinated on. In an interview with Voice of America, journalist Babak Dad mentioned widespread rape of boys in Kahrizak Detention Center, especially the severe rape of a young boy named Mehdi, which caused an intestinal infection and a ruptured anus. A journalist and human rights activist who was himself detained for a while also said that they have received reports of sexual threats and detainees being held naked in places controlled by the police and the IRGC (including the Kahrizak Cellar and the Pasargad Cellar), indicating brutal treatment of them.

Reaction from organizations outside Iran

Amnesty International called for an investigation into torture and sexual assault in Iranian prisons. The Secretary-General of Amnesty International said: “The forms of ill-treatment described indicate that the victims were humiliated in the most extreme ways and, if these allegations are true, the authorities must be held accountable without delay.”

US Republican Senator Thaddeus McCotter also mentioned in his speech to the US Congress the rape and murder of one of the detainees, Taraneh Mousavi.

Threats of rape

According to Mohsen Makhmalbaf, many were also threatened with rape of their relatives, such as Mohammad-Ali Abtahi, who, after meeting with his family in prison, was threatened with rape of his wife and daughters if he did not confess.

Victims of rape (2009)

Maryam Sabri, Arash Tavakoli, Ibrahim Sharif and Ebrahim Mehtari were four of the protesters against the results of the 2009 presidential election who were able to leave Iran and stated in interviews that they were in prisons Iran has raped them. Maryam Sabri has spoken of repeated rape.

After 2009

In March 2020, journalist and human rights activist Narges Mohammadi reported in an interview that she had been sexually harassed by the prison warden and some prison guards. She said that despite a forensic medical certificate showing bruises on 24 places on her body, including her neck, chest, thighs, and legs, her complaint was not addressed.

People such as Niloufar Bayani, Hengameh Shahidi, Nigara Afsharzadeh, Sepideh Qolian, etc. have also been threatened or sexually harassed in prisons of the Islamic Republic.

In a letter to Seyyed Ali Khamenei on February 12, 2018, Niloufar Bayani explained the behavior of the IRGC interrogators, writing in part that she was “transferred to a private villa in Lavasan with seven armed men so that, despite her refusal, she would be forced to watch their immoral and un-Islamic behavior in a private pool.”

Sexual Harassment of Prisoners in the November 2019 Protests

Some prisoners in the November 2019 protests in Iran or their relatives were threatened, harassed, or sexually assaulted.

Mahsa Amini protests

Following the 2022 Nationwide Protests In Iran, Armita Abbasi was raped several times and on October 16, she was taken to Imam Ali Hospital in Karaj by plainclothes officers and abducted from the hospital by security officers. According to CNN, leaked documents from conversations between doctors in private Instagram messages indicate that “government security forces tortured and sexually assaulted her.”

Works on Rape and Torture

• The Crime of Impunity (Torture and Sexual Violence Against Female Political Prisoners in the Islamic Republic); 2 volumes;
• White Torture is a writing by Narges Mohammadi about sexual and non-sexual torture of female prisoners (such as: Narges Mohammadi, Nigara Afsharzadeh, Atena Daemi, Zahra Zehtabchi, Nazanin Zaghari, Mahvash Shahriari, Hengameh Shahidi, Reyhaneh Tabatabaei, Sima Kiani, Fatemeh Mohammadi, Sedighe Moradi, and Shokofeh Yadollahi Names of some torturers.
• Under the Bushes of Laleh Abbasi; a book by Nasrin Parvaz.

See also

• Human rights in the Islamic Republic of Iran
• Wikipedia Farsi

References

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Categories:

• Rape in Iran
• Prison rape
• Human rights in Iran
• Human rights abuses in Iran