Authorities of Khoy Prison have seized the personal belongings including blankets, personal clothes, books and booklets of the Kurdish political prisoner known as Zeynab Jalalian without providing any specific reason.
“Several inspectors of Khoy Prison visited Women’s Ward on the morning of Nov 28, 2018, inspected Zeynab Jalalian’s beds and seized all her personal belongings including blankets, clothes, books and booklets. Giving her several blankets, they told her that she did not have the right to keep any other things except the clothes she was wearing until further notice.”, a reliable source has told Kurdistan Human Rights Network (KHRN).
According to the source, this inspection has led to the protest of Zeynab Jalalian and her other fellow prisoners who have not seen such an behaviour before. In response to the protests, the Inspection Department of Khoy Prison announced that the inspection has been carried out by the order of senior authorities.
The source further added that Jalalian’s family, who had referred to the Khoy Central Prison on Monday, Nov. 26, 2018 to visit her, were interrogated before being allowed to visit her after several hours of delay.
During the past few months, the pressure on this political prisoner has increased per instructions by the Ministry of Intelligence.
On July 30, following the announcement of a three-day hunger strike by Zeynab Jalalianand nine prisoners of ordinary offences in protest to being deprived of weekly family visits and basic prison facilities, one of the websites linked to the Ministry of Intelligence denied the strike’s news by publishing an interview with a person called “Mostafa Moloodi” who introduced himself as Zeynab Jalalian’s lawyer.
In a conversation with KHRN later, this political prisoner denied having such a person as a lawyer. Further investigations by KHRN has also revealed that such a lawyer did not exist.
It should also be noted that the Ministry of Intelligence had previously shown several forged documents from the Prison Health Centre in a documentary on the press TV while claiming that Zeynab Jalalian had been transferred to the hospital for the medical treatment. Such a claim was later denied by Zeynab Jalalian.
Zeynab Jalalian, born in 1982. is a Kurdish activist from a small village known as Deim Qeshlaq around Maku in Eastern Azerbaijan province in Iran. She was arrested in February 2007 by the forces of Kermanshah Intelligence Bureau on charges of membership in PJAK. She was interrogated at Intelligence Detention Centre in Kermanshah for a month while being seriously tortured both mentally and physically. She was then transferred to Kermanshah Youth Rehabilitation Centre but she was repeatedly taken back to the Security Detention Centre for further interrogations.
On 3r December 2008, Jalalian was sentenced to death on accounts of “armed actions against Islamic Republic of Iran and membership in PJAK in addition to possessing and carrying illegal weapons while engaging in acts of propaganda warfare against the Islamic Republic of Iran” by Judge Moradi at the Revolutionary Court of Kermanshah (branch 1). This sentence was later affirmed on April 2, 2009 by Judge Ali Mohammad Roshani at the Kermanshah Court of Appeals (branch 4) despite the contest statements prepared by her lawyer.
The Supreme Court confirmed her death sentence on 26 November 2009. She was transferred to an unknown location from Kermanshah Prison before being taken to Evin Prison in Tehran in early March 2010. She was held in ward 209 of Evin Prison for five months before being transferred to Dizelabad Prison in Kermanshah again since she refused to accept the authorities’ condition for emancipation from death sentence. She was offered to be emancipated from death sentence if she would do a TV interview. She was at imminent risk of execution after the sentence was confirmed. However, her death sentence was reduced to life imprisonment in November 2011.
In November 2014, she was transferred to Khoy prison which is three hours away from her family’s residence. Such distance makes visitations for her relatives, specifically her elderly parents, very challenging. During the past 10 years of her imprisonment, she has been denied the right to temporary compassionate leave as well as medical treatment outside the prison for her illnesses caused by torture and bad prison conditions.
Zeynab Jalalian has been on a medicinal strike and she has not been taking her prescribed medications since February 2017.
