U.S. State Department's Reaction to the Death of Mohammad Raji in Prison

Heather Nauert, spokesperson for the U.S. State Department, expressed sorrow on Tuesday, March 6, over the news of the death of Mohammad Raji, a member of the Gonabadi dervishes, who reportedly died 'in custody and during interrogation.' According to the U.S. State Department's Facebook page, Nauert stated, 'Once again, we are saddened to hear about the death of a political prisoner in custody; reports indicate that Mohammad Raji, one of the Gonabadi dervishes, died in prison during interrogation in Iran.' The Majdoubane Noor website, which publishes news about the Gonabadi dervishes, reported that Raji was arrested during the events of Golestan 7 on the first of Esfand and died due to beatings during detention. However, Abbas Jafari Dolatabadi, the Tehran prosecutor, denied on Tuesday that Raji died during interrogation, claiming he was killed during clashes between the dervishes and security forces on Pasdaran Street. Meanwhile, Raji's body was buried on Tuesday evening in Aligudarz with the presence of a few family members and security forces. Tayebeh Raji, Mohammad Raji's daughter, reported yesterday in an interview with Radio Farda that security forces threatened their family, demanding the body be buried at night, but the Raji family refused this request. Concerns over the continued repression of dervishes The U.S. State Department spokesperson further stated, 'We continue to receive troubling reports about the violent and ongoing repression of Gonabadi dervishes by the Iranian regime across the country, with hundreds detained and some hospitalized.' Nauert emphasized, 'We call on the Iranian regime to respect the rights of its citizens and release all unjustly imprisoned political prisoners.' According to reports, Mohammad Raji was a former commander of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) and was chemically injured during the Iran-Iraq war. As the Majdoubane Noor website notes, he had been engaged in farming in the village of Mazraeh Abad in Aligudarz since separating from the IRGC in 2004. Previously, reports had also emerged about the deaths of three detained dervishes in the hospital, and Gholamhossein Mohseni Ejei, the judiciary spokesperson, confirmed the death of one dervish in the hospital, although he did not mention the name of this individual at that time. In recent days, videos and photos of severe 'beatings' of detained dervishes and reports of 'head, jaw, and several teeth fractures' and poor physical conditions of some of them have been published. Judiciary officials have emphasized the need for 'swift and expedited punishment' for detained Gonabadi dervishes involved in the clashes on Pasdaran Street, and the commander of Tehran's police announced that the driver of a bus, who allegedly ran over three police officers, causing their deaths, would be executed before the end of the year 1396 (March 2018). Meanwhile, on Saturday, 87 political and civil activists issued a statement emphasizing that the published news about the 'immediate and expedited trial' of detained dervishes has already undermined the principle of the independence and impartiality of the court. The emphasis by Islamic Republic officials on punishing detained Gonabadi dervishes comes as a protest gathering by Gonabadi dervishes around the house of Nourali Tabandeh, the leader of this order, turned violent on Monday, February 19, due to the intervention of security forces and plainclothes motorcyclists. Earlier, the Human Rights Defenders Center, led by Shirin Ebadi, reported in its February report on human rights violations in Iran that 'the presence and intervention of Basij forces at the scene of incidents is the source of many unfortunate events in street protests.' The Gonabadi dervishes' gathering on Monday, February 19, initially began in front of Police Station 102 in northern Tehran in protest against the arrest of one of the dervishes named Nematollah Riahi.