Amnesty International Calls for Immediate Release of Abdolfattah Soltani

Amnesty International, in a post on the Telegram channel of its Iran section, has called for the immediate release of Abdolfattah Soltani, a lawyer and human rights advocate. In a statement marking the sixth anniversary of Mr. Soltani's detention, Magdalena Mughrabi, Deputy Director for the Middle East and North Africa at Amnesty International, emphasized that Soltani's prolonged imprisonment is a "great injustice and a testament to the severe repression of those who bravely work to support and promote human rights." Mughrabi urged Iranian authorities to end what she describes as the misuse of the criminal justice system to silence human rights defenders. Abdolfattah Soltani, a lawyer and member of the Human Rights Defenders Center, has been imprisoned in Evin since September 2011. He was sentenced to 13 years in prison and a two-year ban from practicing law on charges of propaganda against the regime and forming and managing a group aimed at undermining national security. If Article 134 of the Islamic Penal Code is applied to Mr. Soltani, his sentence would be reduced to 10 years, meaning he has already served more than half of his sentence. According to this legal provision, if a person has multiple offenses, only the highest sentence is considered. According to Amnesty International, Mr. Soltani is imprisoned under poor conditions and lacks proper access to medical care, and despite doctors' recommendations, he has repeatedly been denied medical leave or transfer to a hospital. His health has deteriorated during his years in prison, suffering from illnesses such as anemia, fluctuating blood pressure, and severe colitis. He has had minimal leave, having only successfully obtained permission for leave three times, one of which was during his mother's death. Mr. Soltani's first leave was granted in January 2016 after serving four years and four months in prison, and he recently had a few days of leave in July of this year. One of the charges against Abdolfattah Soltani is receiving the Nuremberg Human Rights Prize from Germany, and another charge is related to informing about his clients' cases, which includes various political, ideological, and union activists.