Iran’s regime has engaged in a deliberate strategy to eliminate dissidents through medical neglect, judicial terror, and psychological warfare inside its dungeons.
For Iran’s political prisoners, the war on dissent does not end at the prison gates; it intensifies. A prison sentence under the clerical regime is often the beginning of a new, harrowing battle for survival against a system designed to break their will or, failing that, end their lives.
The weaponization of medicine: a strategy of ‘slow execution’
The regime is systematically using the denial of medical care as a weapon to torture and kill political prisoners. This is not mere negligence, but a deliberate and well-documented policy of slow execution.
The most recent and tragic example is the death of Somayeh Rashidi, a 42-year-old political prisoner who died in Qarchak Prison on September 25, 2025. Her life could have been saved, but she was deliberately denied medical care. Despite suffering repeated seizures, her transfer to a hospital was fatally delayed. The torturer posing as prison doctor dismissed her condition, claiming she was “feigning illness.” By the time she was finally moved to a hospital, doctors described her condition as “critical,” and she died shortly after.
This is a recurring pattern of criminal malpractice. Mohammad Ali Akbari Monfared, a 58-year-old political prisoner paralyzed in both legs and suffering from severe heart disease and diabetes, is being left to perish in Fashafuyeh Prison. Even the regime’s own Legal Medicine Organization has stated his condition is so severe he cannot endure imprisonment. Yet, the Ministry of Intelligence is actively preventing his release, condemning him to a slow death. Similarly, political prisoner Abolhassan Montazer was left handcuffed to a hospital chair for 24 hours without food or care while suffering from a dangerously low platelet count. Prison authorities later refused to procure essential medication prescribed by his doctor, effectively abandoning his treatment.
This brutal reality is so undeniable that 30 political prisoners in Evin issued a public statement following Somayeh Rashidi’s death, condemning it as a murder caused by the authorities’ deliberate disregard for prisoners’ lives and demanding the unconditional release of all ill prisoners.
Judicial terror: fabricated charges and death sentences from behind bars
For prisoners who survive the harsh conditions and medical neglect, the regime’s judiciary deploys another weapon: fabricated charges to extend sentences or impose the death penalty. The courtroom becomes another battlefield where justice is a mockery.
On September 27, the regime’s judiciary sentenced two political prisoners, Hamed Validi and Nima Shahi, to death by baselessly linking them to Mossad. This is a tired and repetitive trick the regime uses to demonize PMOI supporters and justify their execution. The judiciary’s own news agency, Mizan, announced the verdict without even naming the prisoners, exposing the farcical and opaque nature of these kangaroo courts.
This judicial persecution is also used to silence former prisoners who refuse to be broken. Shahin Zoghi-Tabar, who had already served a four-year prison sentence, was re-arrested on July 24, 2025, when intelligence agents violently raided his home without a warrant. He was recently sentenced to another 10 years in prison on charges including “membership and support for the PMOI.”
Psychological warfare and collective punishment
The regime’s assault is not only physical but also psychological, targeting prisoners and their families to crush any remaining hope or resolve.
On September 30, political prisoner Mehdi Vafaei Sani was summoned from his ward in Evin Prison under the pretext of a family visit, only to be ambushed by intelligence agents and forcibly taken to an unknown location.
This cruelty is amplified by the regime’s systemic policy of collective punishment. Mehdi’s mother is also a political prisoner, and his cousin, Mohammad Javad Vafaei Sani, is on death row for his affiliation with the PMOI. The Akbari Monfared family tells a similar story of generational persecution: four of Mohammad Ali’s siblings were executed in the 1980s, while his sister, Maryam Akbari Monfared, has been imprisoned for 16 years simply for seeking justice for them.
A call for international intervention
The evidence is overwhelming: Iran’s prisons are not correctional facilities but instruments of state-sponsored terror. The regime is waging a systematic war of extermination against political prisoners. The international community cannot remain silent in the face of these crimes against humanity. As the Iranian Resistance has repeatedly urged, it is time for the UN Human Rights Council, the High Commissioner for Human Rights, and international fact-finding missions to take urgent action. They must investigate these crimes, demand access to Iran’s prisons, and hold the perpetrators accountable to save the lives of those who continue to resist tyranny, even from behind bars.