On Friday, Sept 1, 2017, the final results of the entrance exam for Master’s level was announced in Iran and one of the Kurdish students was deprived of the right to continue his study at this stage on the pretext of being a “Starred student”. (“Starred students” are university students banned from continuing their higher education as a result of their student and/or political activities, or their religion in Iran.)

Farhad Shafizadeh, a former Kurdish student activist, was deprived of the right to continue his education at Master’s level in the field of Western Philosophy at Tabriz University despite obtaining rank 57 among the applicants of studying at Master’s level. He was told that his university dossier lacked some of the required documents.

Upon referring to the National Organisation of Educational Testing, the concerned student was told that Marivan Intelligent Office and the Security Department of Tabriz University had prohibited the university authorities to enrol him. He was then advised to refer to these two security organizations and obtain their permission.

The final results of the entrance exam for Master’s level

Farhad Shafizadeh, a former student activist at Tabriz University and a member of the editorial board of Astaneh student magazine was detained by security forces on Sept 11, 2014, and was transferred to the prison from the Intelligence detention centre of Marivan after twenty days. He was temporarily released until his trial after a week on a bail of 100 million Tomans.

He was sentenced to one-year imprisonment by the Revolutionary Court of Marvin on charges of disrupting public order and insulting the authorities in December 2014.

Moreover, just a week after the above sentence was issued, the Disciplinary Committee of Tabriz University suspended his education for two semesters including the duration of his study in addition to depriving him of welfare services until the end of his study. Such punitive decision was made based on several alleged charges including “disrupting the order of the University”, “holding a sit-in” in addition to “protesting and criticising the political figures of the country”.

He was transferred to the Marivan Prison after the sentence was finalised and released on December 6, 2015, following a year of imprisonment