Kurdish Political Prisoner Kamal Sharifi Deprived of Fundamental Rights After 17 Years of Imprisonment by Iranian Authorities
Hengaw, Saturday, June 8, 2024
After seventeen years of imprisonment, Kamal Sharifi, a Kurdish political prisoner, is still deprived of his fundamental rights in Minab Prison. Given his current health condition, it seems impossible for him to endure serving his sentence.
According to reports received by the Hengaw, Kamal Sharifi, a 52-year-old Kurdish political prisoner and journalist from Saqqez, is in his seventeenth year of imprisonment and remains deprived of the right to leave and family visits.
Sharifi is still being held in the ward for dangerous criminals in Minab Prison, Hormozgan Province, and continues to face physical and psychological abuse from prison officials and security agencies.
Recent reports on Sharifi's health indicate that his teeth have been broken due to repeated torture and beatings during his detention and interrogation by the Intelligence Department. He is in urgent need of medical attention.
Notably, Sharifi suffered strokes and heart attacks in 2012 and 2020. In the first incident, he lost the ability to move the right side of his body. During the second incident, he underwent surgery in a hospital in Bandar Abbas.
Sharifi was sentenced to 30 years of imprisonment and exile to Minab Prison in a five-minute trial presided over by Judge Shayegh of Branch 1 of the Saqqez Revolutionary Court on charges of "waging war against God through membership in the Democratic Party of Iranian Kurdistan." He has been denied all prisoner rights, including leave, employment, family visits, and other forms of communication.
During his only in-person visit in 2012, on the 48th day of his hunger strike, the brother and mother of Kamal Sharifi visited him in the prison warden's office with several prison staff present. Sharifi stated, "I was not even allowed to speak Kurdish with my mother; they forced me to speak Persian, which my mother does not understand." This brief visit was arranged solely by the Sanandaj Intelligence Department to end Sharifi's hunger strike.
Kamal Sharifi was arrested by IRGC forces on May 25, 2008. He was transferred blindfolded and handcuffed to the Sanandaj Intelligence Department detention center by order of the Saqqez prosecutor on the same day.
On May 12, 2009, Sharifi was transferred to Minab Central Prison, where he has since been deprived of all his fundamental rights due to pressure from the Sanandaj Intelligence Department.
It is also noteworthy that in 1989 and 1990, Sharifi was sentenced to two years in prison and 40 lashes by the Saqqez Revolutionary Court on charges of "supporting and collaborating with the Democratic Party of Iranian Kurdistan."
