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IRAN - Kurdish Pregnant Inmate Shahla Abdi Faces
January 25, 2023: JANUARY 25, 2023 - Kurdish Pregnant Inmate Faces "Imminent Execution"
Iranian judicial officials have sentenced a pregnant woman in her early-20s to death, and her execution is imminent, IranWire understands.
Shahla Abdi, an ethic Kurd from the northwestern province of West Azerbaijan, was arrested in Urmia in mid-October at the peak of nationwide protests triggered by the September death of Mahsa Amini in the custody of morality police.
Abdi is said to have received capital punishment for setting fire to a portrait of Ruhollah Khomeini, the founding father of the Islamic Republic.
A fellow woman inmate told IranWire that Abdi was held in Urmia Central Prison for about a month. Some prisoners say the young woman was transferred to Tabriz Prison about three weeks ago; according to others, she was taken to the detention center of the Ministry of Intelligence.
"When I saw this woman, she looked very young but weak and abused, and I realized that she was four months pregnant," the inmate said.
Another inmate said that Abdi is 21 or 22 years old.
Abdi was kept in solitary confinement in Urmia Central Prison. At the facility's store, two officers were always accompanying her to make sure that she did not talk to anyone.
"She was in a very shocked state. It was obvious that she hadn’t taken a shower for a long time, and her hair was very messy. She was very scared," another inmate said. She did not know what exactly Shahla was scared of.
This prisoner said that the living conditions in the prison are very difficult.
"A woman was sick for two months, and they didn’t even give her one single pill," she said.
Zahra Nabizadeh was six months pregnant when she was arrested on January 18 in the town of Mahabad, in West Azerbaijan province, according to Hengaw, a Norway-based group that monitors rights violations in Iran's Kurdish regions.
Hengaw said Nabizadeh suffered a miscarriage after security forces kicked her in the stomach during her arrest.
Nabizadeh was handed a death sentence and is now awaiting execution in prison.
At least two other pregnant protesters have been arrested in recent weeks and remain behind bars.
IranWire is a website for Iranian citizen journalists founded by Maziar Bahari, an Iranian-Canadian journalist, filmmaker and human rights activist who spent time imprisoned in Tehran’s notorious Evin jail in 2009.
https://iranwire.com/en/prisoners/113036-iranwire-exclusive-kurdish-pregnant-inmate-faces-imminent-execution-in-iran/
https://www.thenationalnews.com/mena/iran/2023/01/26/iran-sentences-pregnant-kurdish-woman-to-death/
https://www.hawarnews.com/en/haber/sara-organization-condemns-death-sentence-against-pregnant-kurdish-detainee-in-irans-prisons-h34937.html (Source: iranwire.com)
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