The Iranian authorities have extended detention of several Kurdish activists, five of whom come from the Saqez area, another from Kamyaran and the other activist is a renowned former political prisoner from Orumiyeh prison.
The detained activists are being held at security detention centres run by the Iranian Intelligence Ministry and Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) in the cities of Sanandaj and Oroumiyeh.
“Six cars of the of Sanandaj branch of the Intelligence Ministry raided a private house party in Saqez on 14 February 2016. They arrested 14 Kurdish civil rights activists [at the party] and the host’s mother was sprayed with tear-gas, after which the detained were also outrageously insulted,” a reliable source told Kurdistan Human Rights Network (KHRN).
The source said that “nine of the detained activists were later released on parole from a detention centre of the Intelligence Ministry, but five of them remained in custody and were transferred to the detention centres of the ministry’s branch in Sanandaj on 20 February.”
The source said that detained activists are Nader Majidian (editor of the website www.dahatu.com), Fateh Davandari, Behrouz Risheh-Saheb, Farshad Radaei and Vafa Firouzeh.
“The arbitrary detention of Hossein Kamangar was extended on 18 February, and he is a well-known Kurdish activist and former political prisoner re-arrested 45 days ago in the Kamyaran area He has since been deprived of any communication with his family,” the source said.
Kamangar was first arrested in February 2012 in Kermanshah and held for two months in detention centres of the Intelligence Ministry in Kermanshah and Rawansar areas
He was later released on bail but later rearrested with fellow Kurdish activists in Kamyaran.
The Islamic Revolutionary Court of Sanandaj sentenced him to 10 months behind bars on charges of “actions to disrupt national security”.
He was released from Sanandaj prison after having served seven months of his sentence.
The source went on saying that “the Iranian authorities have also been silent on the fate of Kamal Hossein Ramezan, who was transferred from political prisoners’ ward 12 of Oroumiyeh prison to an IRGC detention centre. Nobody has since heard about him. The prosecutor has announced that he will be kept at least for three more months for interrogation for previous charges and the new allegation of ‘propaganda against the state’.”
Ramezan, 31, is originally a Syrian Kurds born in Serelaniye (also known in Arabic as Ras al-Ayin) near Koabne in Syria’s Kurdish north known as Rojava.
IRGC arrested him when he was with local Kurdish activists near Oroumiyeh in June 2014.
He was interrogated for around four months in an IRGC security detention centre where he was accused of a ‘Mohareb’ (enmity against God), an Islamic law.
He was later transferred to ward 1 of Oroumiyeh Revolutionary Court to be interrogated again forhis ‘enmity against God’ and alleged membership in the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK).
He was later transferred to Oroumiyeh central prison.
