AI Index:
MDE 13/086/2006Public)
News Service No: 2011 August 2006
The death in custody of Akbar Mohammadi, a 38-year-old
former student, in the early hours of 31
July 2006 casts a pall over the entire Iranian justice system,
Amnesty International said today.
"The series of failures to afford Akbar Mohammadi justice have
robbed him of his life and his family of human dignity. There can be no more
deaths in Iranian custody. A thorough reform of the criminal justice system is
urgently needed," added the organisation.
"The Iranian authorities need to
take urgent measures to ensure that political prisoners are afforded a fair and
open trial; that torture and other ill-treatment in Iranian prisons is halted and that the practice of delaying or denying
medical care is stopped immediately."
Amnesty International is alarmed at
reports indicating that following an inspection of Akbar
Mohammadi's detention conditions by senior officials
he was administered a drug which may have resulted not only in his tranquillisation but possibly, as a result of a
complication, his death.
From around 21 July, Akbar Mohammadi had reportedly
undertaken a hunger strike, the last three days of which he refused liquids as
well as solids.
Amidst reports that an autopsy has been
carried out domestically by the coroner (/pezeshk-e qanouni/),Amnesty International
considers that there needs to be an independent investigation and autopsy by
fully independent pathologists to determine the cause of Akbar
Mohammadi's death and the conditions that facilitated
it.
Principle 9 of the UN Principles on the
Effective Prevention and Investigation of extra-Legal, Arbitrary and Summary
Executions states: "There shall be thorough, prompt and impartial
investigation of all suspected cases of extra-legal, arbitrary and summary
executions, including cases where complaints by relatives or other reliable
reports suggest unnatural death in the above circumstances. [] The purpose of
the investigation shall be to determine the cause, manner and time of death,
the person responsible, and any pattern or practice which may have brought
about that death. It shall include an adequate autopsy, collection and analysis
of all physical and documentary evidence and statements from witnesses."
Amnesty International also expressed
concern that political prisoners Heshmatollah Tabarzadi, Ahmad Batebi and Akbar
Mohammadi's brother Manuchehr
are facing heightened risk following this latest death in custody.
Background
Akbar Mohammadi was one of the thousands of students arrested in
July 1999 after student demonstrations which erupted following the closure of
newspapers and one of the periodic clampdowns on freedom of expression that
occurred throughout the late 1990s in Iran.
Akbar Mohammadi and other students were sentenced to death in
September 1999 following a manifestly unfair trial. He was brutally tortured
while in incommunicado detention, denied the right of
legal representation and access to family. Following domestic and international
outcry, in November 1999 the sentences were commuted to 15 years' imprisonment.
From the day of his arrest, Akbar Mohammadi was routinely
tortured. While in the custody of the Ministry of Intelligence, he was
allegedly suspended by his arms, and violently beaten. Guards beat him to the
edge of consciousness, telling him that all he had to do was blink to accept
the charges against him.
The information available strongly
indicates that the repeated delays or outright denials of adequate medical care
by Iran's
judicial and prison authorities have contributed to his death in custody. At
the end of November 2003, for example, judicial authorities permitted his hospitalisation in response to urgent stomach and kidney
problems, internal bleeding and possibly a lung infection. Despite medical
advice that he be hospitalised for one month, he was
returned to Evin Prison one week later.
Between July 2004 and June 2006, Akbar Mohammadi resided at his
family home in Amol, northern Iran,
where he received medical treatment and wrote a prison memoir. He was re-arrested
on 11 June 2006 and
returned to Evin prison where, once again, he was denied the right to meet with
his family. Following one visit by his lawyer, Akbar Mohammadi was said to be in ill health and suffering from
acute abdominal pain. Prison medical staff reportedly advised that he should be
removed from prison for medical treatment.
According to sources inside Evin
prison, he sought medical care from around 26 July during his hunger strike but
he was chastised by medical officials who rejected his request. Between 26 and
29 July, he was reportedly provided unspecified treatment, though an Iranian
parliamentary delegation visiting Evin prison was denied permission to visit
the section of the prison -- possibly the clinic itself -- in which he was
held.
On or around 29-30
July he was reportedly gagged and bound to a bed while senior officials visited
the prison. The Chief Prosecutor for the province
of Tehran, Said Mortazavi,
and two senior prison officials, along with a prison guard reportedly inspected
him on 30 July, during which time he was administered an unspecified medicine'.
His condition reportedly worsened in the course of that day and he died on 31
July. Despite the call by his lawyer that his body be examined by an
independent team of pathologists, his body was transferred to a coroner on 31
July.
Akbar Mohammadi's parents arrived at Imam
Khomeini Airport
in Tehran on Tuesday 1 August 2006, at 02:30 local time, from a visit outside the country. They
were forcibly taken directly from the aircraft to awaiting vehicles and driven
directly to their house in Amol, northern Iran.
They were denied permission to see the body of their deceased son, as was his
brother Manuchehr, who remains in Evin prison. At the
time of writing, there are reports that the body of Akbar
Mohammadi has been buried.
Public Document
For more information please call
Amnesty International's press office in London,
UK, on +44 20 7413 5566
Amnesty International, 1 Easton St., London
WC1X 0DW.web: http://www.amnesty.org
For latest human rights news view http://news.amnesty.org
