PEN International is delighted to learn of the release yesterday, 7 October 2020, of Narges Mohammadi, a writer, journalist and activist who had been in prison since May 2015. She was serving a sentence totalling 16 years for her human rights activism. During her imprisonment she staged protests against prison conditions and suffered ill-health for which she was deprived adequate medical care. Her freedom came after her sentence was reduced.

Welcoming her release, PEN International Writers in Prison Committee Chair, Salil Tripathi wrote: “Narges Mohammadi will never get back the years taken away from her unjustly by the Iranian state. We are overjoyed and celebrate her freedom but we must never forget that she should never have been detained in the first place. Restoration of her rights was what the government owed her and the least it could do. Supporting her rights and defending her freedom is what we will continue to do from the PEN community”.

In September 2020, 16 UN experts had made a joint appeal for Mohammadi’s release citing concerns for her welfare while COVID-19 runs rampant in Iranian prisons.

Read more on Narges Mohammadi’s imprisonment here.

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