The prison sentence of Kurdish political prisoner, Ahmedreza Haeri extended Under Pressure from IRGC Intelligence in Ghezel Hesar Prison, Karaj

Hengaw: Sunday, November 10, 2024 

 The prison sentence of Kurdish political prisoner Ahmedreza Haeri, a resident of Ilam who is serving a three-year and eight-month sentence, has been extended to six years and three months under direct pressure from the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) intelligence. 

 According to a report received by the Hengaw Organization for Human Rights, Tehran’s Branch 36 Court of Appeals has extended Ahmedreza Haeri’s imprisonment by two years and seven months. Haeri, who is currently imprisoned in Ghezel Hesar Prison in Karaj, has now been given a total applicable prison sentence of four years. 

 Haeri’s Instagram page described the issuance of this new sentence, along with the year-long concealment of its announcement, as an attempt to hinder his retrial process and prevent his potential release. 

 The report goes on to say that an IRGC intelligence letter attached to Haeri’s file, which was submitted to the judiciary, claims that his statements about “torture, mock executions, and human rights violations against executed prisoners” have contributed to international human rights sanctions against the Islamic Republic of Iran. 

 On May 19, 2024, Haeri was moved from the general ward of Ghezel Hesar Prison to solitary confinement. 

 In September 2022, he was sentenced by Tehran’s Revolutionary Court to three years and eight months in prison on charges of “assembly and collusion against national security,” as well as an additional eight months for “propaganda against the state.” Under Iran’s Islamic Penal Code, his sentence was capped at a maximum of three years and eight months. 

On May 10, 2023, he was taken into custody to serve his sentence, initially held at Evin Prison, and in September 2023, he and twelve other political prisoners were transferred to Ghezel Hesar and placed in the high-risk offenders’ ward. 

 In July 2023, following a complaint filed against him by Tehran’s Prison Organization during his imprisonment, Tehran’s Criminal Court 2 sentenced him to three months and one day for “assembly and collusion against national security.” 

Haeri had also previously been arrested in July 2022 by security forces, and he was released from Evin Prison in August of the same year on bail of one billion tomans.