December protests – Eleven teachers and students detained by Iranian forces

Hengaw – Monday, January 5, 2026

At least eleven individuals, including eight university students, two teachers, and one university lecturer, have been arrested by Iranian government forces in the cities of Mahabad, Esfarayen, Tehran, Gilan, Takestan, and Mashhad, and transferred to undisclosed locations.

According to information received by Hengaw Organization for Human Rights, Iman Cheshteh, a 23-year-old Kurdish law student at Mahabad University from Piranshahr, was arrested at the Darlek intersection in Mahabad on Sunday, January 4, 2026.

Later that evening, Sahand Nejatbakhsh and Amin Karimi, both students at Iran University of Science and Technology, along with Nabi Omidi, an associate professor of economics at Payam Noor University in Ilam, were also arrested by government forces.

Amin Karimi was released after interrogation, during which his identification documents were confiscated.

Samyar Motallebi, a music student at the University of Art in Tehran; Ramin Pourasl, a graduate in composition from the same university; Ehsan Masoudi, an undergraduate biology student at the University of Tehran; and Mobin Safdari, an undergraduate physics student at the University of Tehran, were also detained by government forces later the same day.

Pouria Aliyari, a 20-year-old student of safety engineering at the Esfarayen Higher Technical and Engineering Education Complex and a previously detained participant in the “Woman, Life, Freedom (Jin, Jiyan, Azadi)” movement, was arrested during public protests in Esfarayen on the evening of Saturday, January 3, 2026.

Esmail Khodayari, a teacher from Takestan in Qazvin Province, was arrested by plainclothes agents later that day and subsequently sentenced on charges of “propaganda against the regime.”

Fatemeh Zarei, a retired teacher in Mashhad, was arrested on Friday, January 2, 2026. No information has been made available regarding her whereabouts or condition.