On January 1, 2024, the Women’s Committee of The National Council of Resistance of Iran declared that Maryam Akbari Monfared, one of the longest-held female political prisoners in Iran, has been handed an additional three years in two separate trials. This sentence extension, totaling 18 years, impedes her release after completing a 15-year term.
An urgent appeal is being directed to the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, the Human Rights Council, and other advocates, urging their immediate intervention to secure the freedom of Maryam Akbari.
The full text of the Women’s Committee of the NCRI as follows:
The clerical regime’s judiciary sentenced political prisoner Maryam Akbari Monfared to an additional 3 years in prison through 2 separate fabricated cases filed by the Ministry of Intelligence. These cases were heard in orchestrated courts in Semnan and Evin, hindering her release after completing a 15-year sentence. Consequently, she now faces a total of 18 years in prison.
The statement of the NCRI Secretariat on August 28, 2023, stated, “The Ministry of Intelligence (MOIS) has initiated two new cases against Maryam Akbari to prevent her release. One accuses her of ‘propaganda against the regime,’ while the other alleges ‘insulting the Supreme Leader (Khamenei), incitement to riot, spreading falsehoods, and disturbing public opinion, inciting people against national security.’”
In another part, the statement added that Branch 101 of Semnan Criminal Court had issued “an additional two years, along with a fine of 150 million rials, as part of a new, in-absentia ruling.”
Subsequently, the Evin Courthouse also held a sham trial sentencing Maryam Akbari to another year in prison in relation to the second case.
According to another statement by the NCRI Secretariat on July 17, 2023, the regime’s judiciary transferred political prisoner Maryam Akbari Monfared from her place of exile in Semnan Prison to Evin Court on Saturday, July 1. After being arraigned on five new charges, she was returned to Semnan Prison.
The mullahs’ judiciary recently upheld the two rulings and endorsed the extension of her sentence by three years, totaling 18 years imprisonment. Under the inhumane laws of the clerical regime, Maryam Akbari was supposed to be released in 2019 after serving 10 years of her sentence. The primary ‘crime’ of this political prisoner over the past decade has been seeking justice for the martyrs, according to the regime’s perspective.
Maryam Akbari’s sister and three brothers were executed by the clerical regime in the 1980s. PMOI member Alireza Akbari was killed under torture in September 1981. Gholamreza Akbar was executed in 1985. Roghiyeh Akbari and Abdolreza Akbari were among the political prisoners massacred in 1988.
Maryam Akbari is one of the longest-held women political prisoners in Iran. She was arrested after the uprising in Tehran on December 27, 2009. The mullahs’ notorious judge, Abolqasem Salavati sentenced her to 15 years in prison on the charge of “Moharebeh” (waging war on God) “through membership in the People’s Mojahedin Organization of Iran (PMOI/MEK).”
Maryam Akbari has completed serving 14 years of that sentence without a single day off even for medical treatment. Prison authorities sent her to internal exile in 2021.
The NCRI Women’s Committee once again urges the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, the UN Human Rights Council, the UNSR on human rights in Iran, the UNSR on violence against women, and other advocates of human rights and women’s rights to vehemently condemn the clerical regime’s inhuman treatment of political prisoners, especially the female prisoners. The NCRI Women’s Committee appeals for urgent action to secure the release of political prisoner Maryam Akbari.
Women’s Committee – The National Council of Resistance of Iran
January 1, 2024
