Hunger Strike of 15 Political and Ideological Prisoners in Rajai Shahr Continues

According to reports, the hunger strike of 15 political and ideological prisoners in Rajai Shahr prison in Karaj continues for 19 days in protest against the violation of their rights, including "denial of daily outdoor exercise," "poor ventilation," "presence of surveillance cameras," and "incomplete return of personal belongings." Some websites reported that the special guard of Rajai Shahr prison transferred political and ideological prisoners from Hall 12 to a new hall "without personal belongings and with physical violence" on Sunday, August 8. According to the International Campaign for Human Rights in Iran, the new hall has more surveillance cameras and "devices that disrupt mobile and internet communications," while other halls do not have surveillance cameras. Following these events, 18 prisoners went on hunger strike from August 8, with the hunger strike of 15 of them still ongoing. Jafar (Shahin) Aghdami, Saeed Masouri, Abolqasem Fooladvand, Hassan Sadeghi, Reza Akbari Monfared, and Amir Ghaziani officially announced their hunger strike by sending a letter to the prison management, while Zanyar Moradi, Luqman Moradi, Saeed Shirzad, and Shahin Zoghi Tabar, among others, did not send a letter to the prison management but are also on hunger strike. The International Campaign for Human Rights in Iran reported, citing a family member of one of the prisoners, that the prisoners have not yet received their clothes, personal belongings, medications, and televisions, refrigerators, and water purification devices that were purchased by the prisoners and were in their previous ward. According to the report, these prisoners have only been allowed to be outside for fresh air three times during this period, "the hall is always closed, and all the small windows of the rooms are covered with thick nets from inside and outside, and the air in the hall does not change at all." The campaign also stated that the prisoners suspect that there are "listening devices" in the new hall. Meanwhile, Mohammad Seifzadeh, a lawyer, stated that the presence of listening devices in this hall "violates privacy and constitutes eavesdropping, which is illegal." More than 50 political prisoners are held in Rajai Shahr prison, most of whom are civil and labor activists, Baha'i citizens, members and supporters of the Mojahedin-e Khalq Organization, or Kurdish political prisoners. In recent years, political prisoners in Iran have repeatedly gone on hunger strikes in protest against the violation of their rights in prison. Reports have mentioned various reasons for the prisoners' protests, including the failure to separate prisoners based on charges, denial of phone contact with families, poor detention conditions, mistreatment by guards, and beatings of prisoners. Many political prisoners have previously stated that the judiciary does not even implement the laws of the Islamic Republic regarding the treatment of prisoners. Some political prisoners have also gone on hunger strikes in recent years in protest against the handling of their cases. Meanwhile, according to reports, Reza Shahabi, a member of the Syndicate of Workers of Tehran Bus Company, has been on hunger strike for the past 10 days. Reza Shahabi has been sentenced to another year in prison in a new case that the Syndicate of Workers of Tehran Bus Company has called "case-making." Additionally, the prosecution has considered five months of the time when Reza Shahabi was on medical leave with the approval of forensic medicine as "absence." In recent years, many political prisoners, including Hadi Saber and Akbar Mohammadi, have died due to lack of medical care during hunger strikes.