Women's Prison: Halls Filled with Inmates

"When I lift my head, I see Simin sitting in front of me, she is 43 years old and has 6 children. She has been in prison for 14 years. They don't grant her leave because her privileges are low! Her eyes are still red and puffy from last night's crying. She was feeling very bad last night and was screaming and crying loudly. She said: 'I want stone bread and butter too!!!' Yesterday, while she was cleaning the prison officers' office to get 20 minutes of phone time, the officers were eating stone bread and butter, and poor Simin saw it..." This is part of a letter published by Maryam Rabiei, a prisoner who has spent the last 17 years in Qarchak Varamin prison. According to statistics released in 2013, only about three percent of prisoners in Iran are women. According to Zahra Bonyanian, an advisor to the Secretary-General of the Drug Control Headquarters on women's and family affairs, in 2013, there were 7,377 women imprisoned in Iran. There is no accurate statistic on the number of women prisoners in the country. Maryam Hosseinkhah, a researcher at the Justice for Iran organization, in response to the question of whether she has a report on the status of women prisoners in Iran, says: "In reports from Dizelabad prison in Kermanshah by Zeynab Jalalian, the only political female prisoner sentenced to life imprisonment, Zeynab said that during her interrogations, she was threatened with sexual assault. They threatened to strip her naked with another man and put them in a room together to pressure her to confess." According to prison officials, due to the reconstruction or repurposing of Evin prison, many female prisoners have been transferred to Qarchak Varamin prison. This prison has recently been visited by two members of Hassan Rouhani's cabinet, who reported on the poor conditions of women prisoners. Although previously, Mohseni Ejei, the Attorney General of the country, had described this prison as a women's prison. Halls filled with women. Elham, a woman who spent a year in Qarchak Varamin prison, describes the situation in the women's prison: "This prison is completely different from other women's prisons in Iran. It is something that one cannot even imagine. Believe me, until I went there and saw it myself, I never thought such a place really existed on earth. A very large, dirty, dark hall filled with women. All the women are poor. There is no proper food or clean water. There is not even drinking water." Describe this hall for us. Is this hall divided into small rooms? Or is the large space available to everyone? No, not at all. It is like a workshop hall. A large hall with a high ceiling, and the beds are arranged all around the hall. The walls are not visible. All the beds are three stories high. The beds are arranged in a U shape. That is, they have created a cabin with the beds. Five or six people are in one cabin. In the space left in the middle of these beds, the prisoners sleep on the ground, up to the bathroom doors. Approximately how many people live in this space? There are seven halls. Each can be said to hold between 160 to 200 people. Some days it varies. Do these halls have any sanitary facilities or showers? Each has four toilets and four showers. Where I was, two of the showers were completely broken. The other two had fluctuating water supply. The toilets were usually one of them was broken. But the other three were functional, but their condition was not very good. What was the sanitary condition of the women there? In conditions where you say there is no drinking water, how did the women maintain their personal hygiene? The water used for bathing or toilets was salty. Did the prison provide sanitary supplies like pads to the women? Not for free; they had to buy them from the store there. Ms. Elham, Negar Haeri, a lawyer who spent some time in Qarchak Varamin prison, said in an interview with the Jaras website that children were also kept in Qarchak prison, and the only difference in the nutrition of these children compared to other prisoners was that they were given a sweet on Thursdays. Did you see these imprisoned children? Yes. There was a special section for those with children. I was in solitary confinement right opposite this section. Until that time, I had never seen children in prison. The two-year-old children only enjoyed playing in the hallway. Approximately how many children were kept there? I saw about 15 to 16 children under two years old there. Children over two years old were handed over to social services. What was the visitation situation there? Could the women have religious visits with their husbands? As I heard from the prisoners, religious visits were given with very long intervals. That is, if someone requested it, they would get a visit at least three to five months later. And that was only for two hours; after two hours, the soldier standing at the door would knock that time was up. Was there a separation of crimes among the halls, or were all prisoners together? Hall one was specifically for women under 22 years old. It did not matter what their crime was. Hall two was for those working in cultural units or workshops, sewing workshops, and such. Hall three had all kinds of crimes, murder, drugs. I was in hall three. Hall four was the same. Halls five and six mostly had those with long sentences, for example, 15 years or more. Their ages were very high. What conditions exist for young girls there? It has been said that Atena Farghadani went on hunger strike just because she could not endure the conditions of Qarchak prison and requested to be transferred to Evin prison. What conditions do young girls have there? There was no difference, whether you were fifty years old or twenty years old. The conditions were the same for everyone. But young girls might be subjected to harassment by older, more experienced prisoners? Yes. I completely infer that because there is nothing else, no entertainment, someone who has fifteen years in prison has nothing to keep them busy. As a result, they occupy themselves with such things. Health in women's prison. However, as Maryam Hosseinkhah, a researcher at the Justice for Iran organization, says, abuse in women's prisons is not limited to female prisoners: "Based on reports we have through Zeynab Jalalian, this political prisoner has also been threatened with rape. We also have a report that one of the male political prisoners was threatened that they would strip Zeynab and him naked and put them in a room together and film them. Well, all of this has a significant impact on Zeynab. But besides that, the conditions in Dizelabad prison are also very bad. The conditions in other women's prisons in various parts of Iran are probably the same. According to reports we have through Zeynab Jalalian's lawyer, in a cell designed for three people, seven are kept. Every two days, the prisoners' cells are searched, and their belongings are confiscated, or for example, their books are torn. On the other hand, they are only allowed half an hour of outdoor time per day, and their cells lack air conditioning and any means for air circulation. The prison store only sells three items like wafers, tea, and juice, and prisoners have no access to other materials." In a letter written from Qarchak Varamin prison, Maryam Rabiei stated that the officer in charge announced over the loudspeaker: "Ladies, pay attention. The hair salon has brought hair dye. Those who are interested can go to the consultation hall. No one is allowed to bring hair dye into the hall." She ended the letter with the sentence: "This place is a hell for me... Meanwhile, the prison officer says: 'hair dye...'" Maryam Hosseinkhah regarding the needs of female prisoners says: "Reports we have received indicate that prisoners need to pay more attention to their health than to hair dye. In addition to the fact that the sanitary conditions in many prisons in Iran, especially women's prisons, are poor, the medical and healthcare services provided to them are also problematic. For example, Zeynab Jalalian is at risk of losing her eyesight due to an eye disease. She has severe intestinal infections and internal bleeding. She has kidney infections, but not only is no medical treatment provided to her, but she is also not allowed to be transferred to a hospital outside the prison for treatment at her family's expense. I don't think this situation is unique to Zeynab Jalalian. Many other prisoners are likely facing similar conditions. Now, the fact that prison officials, instead of addressing these issues, bring up the issue of hair dye, may be because they want to advertise that they are providing all kinds of services to prisoners, including hair dye." Women in the coming year. Maryam Hosseinkhah says that in the upcoming new year, one of the projects of the Justice for Iran organization is to follow up on the status of prisoners, including Zeynab Jalalian, at the United Nations: "We have filed a complaint with the UN Working Group on Arbitrary Detention. This complaint has been jointly filed by the Justice for Iran organization and the International Compensation Organization in the UK, and we are asking this UN working group to issue its ruling regarding the detention and imprisonment of Zeynab Jalalian and to state how much this detention and imprisonment complies with recognized international standards. In the complaint we filed, undeniable documents and evidence show that Zeynab Jalalian was sentenced to life imprisonment in an unfair trial and was severely tortured during her arrest and trial. We hope that with the follow-ups we are doing, the UN will issue a ruling declaring the illegal nature of the actions taken against Zeynab and that Iranian officials will be held accountable in this regard. Following up on the status of political prisoners, including Zeynab Jalalian, is one of our programs for the new year." Roya Karimi Majd. Roya Karimi Majd began her journalism career in Iran in 1992 and joined Radio Farda in May 2008. She is the producer of the weekly program "Another Voice," which focuses on women's issues. In 2015, the Golden Microphone of the New York Radio Festival was awarded to the radio program "Sentegh" produced by Roya Karimi Majd.