UA: 174/18 Index: MDE 13/9179/2018 Iran Date: 01 October 2018
URGENT ACTION
TEACHER TRADE UNIONIST IN NEED OF MEDICAL CARE
Imprisoned Iranian teacher and trade unionist Mohammad Habibi is in poor health and is
being denied the urgent specialized medical care he needs. He is a prisoner of
conscience, serving 10 and a half years in prison solely for exercising his human rights.
He must be immediately and unconditionally released.
Trade unionist and welding teacher Mohammad Habibi, a member of the board of directors of the Iran Teachers
Trade Association – Tehran, is being denied the specialized medical care he needs. In August 2018, this human
rights defender, who is now jailed in Tehran’s prison, was briefly transferred to a hospital in Tehran, where he
was seen by a general practising doctor who said that he needed to have his kidneys examined urgently by a
specialist physician. Despite this, he was taken back to prison without receiving the specialized medical care he
needed. Mohammad Habibi says that he has also been experiencing severe pain in his chest and lungs since his
violent arrest in May 2018. However, the prison medical clinic has simply administered an inhaler to him.
Mohammad Habibi was first arrested on 3 March 2018 outside the school in Tehran where he taught, in front of his
students. He says Revolutionary Guards pepper sprayed and beat him during his arrest and transferred him to an
undisclosed location where he remained in solitary confinement until around 19 March. During this period, he says
he was repeatedly interrogated while blindfolded and subjected to torture and other ill-treatment including through
being slapped in the face, having his head forcibly shaved, and receiving insults and threats against him and his
family. He was then transferred to Evin prison and released on bail on 15 April. He was violently arrested again on
10 May at a peaceful gathering of teachers in Tehran against the poor economic circumstances of teachers and the
lack of sufficient funding for public education. On 23 July, he underwent a grossly unfair trial before Branch 26 of
the Revolutionary Court in Tehran which lasted only two hours and ignored marks of beatings on his body. He was
not allowed to meet with his lawyer until 10 minutes before his trial. In August, he was convicted of several spurious
national security-related charges stemming entirely from his human rights activities as a teacher trade unionist, and
sentenced to 10 and a half years in prison, 74 lashes, a two-year travel ban and a two-year ban on “membership in
political and social parties, groups or collectives”. He is currently appealing his conviction and sentence.
Please write immediately in Persian, English or your own language, calling on the Iranian authorities to:
Release Mohammad Habibi immediately and unconditionally as he is a prisoner of conscience, imprisoned
solely for peacefully exercising his human rights, including through his trade union activism;
Ensure that he is given immediate access to the specialized medical care doctors say he needs in a medical
facility outside prison, in compliance with international standards and medical ethics, including the principles of
confidentially, autonomy and informed consent;
Investigate Mohammad Habibi’s allegations of torture or other ill-treatment, both in detention and du
https://www.amnesty.org/download/Documents/MDE1391792018ENGLISH.pdf
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