Sharareh Abdolhoseinzadeh is a legislation scholar and a PhD in Political Sociology. She information this from Tehran.
On Friday, the 2023 Nobel Peace Prize was awarded to an imprisoned Iranian lady, Narges Mohammadi, a political and civil activist who has been in jail for a few years. In choosing her, the Nobel Committee emphasised her reference to the “Ladies, Life, Freedom” motion and her standing as an inspiration for Iranian ladies. After all, she has been in Evin jail earlier than the “Ladies, Life, Freedom” protests even began, and it seems to be like she is going to stay there for a while, as her jail time period was just lately elevated with a brand new case towards her. However this has not stopped her efforts for human rights and democracy from contained in the jail.
Because the vice-president of the Human Rights Defenders Affiliation in Iran, Mohammadi is the second Iranian to win the Nobel Peace Prize, precisely 20 years after Shirin Ebadi, the top of that affiliation, obtained the award. Ebadi, residing in London since 2009, stated that Narges Mohammadi has spent “years of her life combating for freedom, equality and defending human rights.”
For a few years, as a civil activist, Mohammadi talked concerning the human rights scenario in Iran, the variety of executions and the state of prisons, particularly solitary confinement. In recent times, Mohammadi was not in a position to reside along with his household, who had been pressured to go away Iran. Taqi Rahmani, her husband, left Iran in January 2012, having been arrested greater than eight instances.
That is the Nobel Committee’s full assertion, as launched on Friday:
The Norwegian Nobel Committee has determined to award the Nobel Peace Prize for 2023 to Narges Mohammadi for her combat towards the oppression of ladies in Iran and her combat to advertise human rights and freedom for all. Her courageous wrestle has include super private prices. Altogether, the regime has arrested her 13 instances, convicted her 5 instances, and sentenced her to a complete of 31 years in jail and 154 lashes. Ms Mohammadi remains to be in jail as I communicate.
In September 2022 a younger Kurdish lady, Mahsa Jina Amini, was killed whereas within the custody of the Iranian morality police. Her killing triggered the most important political demonstrations towards Iran’s theocratic regime because it got here to energy in 1979. Beneath the slogan “Lady – Life – Freedom”, a whole bunch of 1000’s of Iranians took half in peaceable protests towards the authorities’ brutality and oppression of ladies. The regime cracked down exhausting on the protests: greater than 500 demonstrators had been killed. Hundreds had been injured, together with many who had been blinded by rubber bullets fired by the police. No less than 20 000 folks had been arrested and held in regime custody.
The motto adopted by the demonstrators – “Lady – Life – Freedom” – suitably expresses the dedication and work of Narges Mohammadi.
Lady. She fights for girls towards systematic discrimination and oppression.
Life. She helps ladies’s wrestle for the suitable to reside full and dignified lives. This wrestle throughout Iran has been met with persecution, imprisonment, torture and even loss of life.
Freedom. She fights for freedom of expression and the suitable of independence, and towards guidelines requiring ladies to stay out of sight and to cowl their our bodies. The liberty calls for expressed by demonstrators apply not solely to ladies, however to your entire inhabitants.
Within the Nineties, as a younger physics scholar, Narges Mohammadi was already distinguishing herself as an advocate for equality and ladies’s rights. After concluding her research, she labored as an engineer in addition to a columnist in numerous reform-minded newspapers. In 2003 she turned concerned with the Defenders of Human Rights Heart in Tehran, an organisation based by Nobel Peace Prize laureate Shirin Ebadi. In 2011 Ms Mohammadi was arrested for the primary time and sentenced to a few years of imprisonment for her efforts to help incarcerated activists and their households.
Two years later, after her launch on bail, Ms Mohammadi immersed herself in a marketing campaign towards use of the loss of life penalty. Iran has lengthy been among the many international locations that execute the very best proportion of their inhabitants yearly. Simply since January 2022, greater than 860 prisoners have been punished by loss of life in Iran.
Her activism towards the loss of life penalty led to the re-arrest of Ms Mohammadi in 2015, and to a sentence of further years behind partitions. Upon her return to jail, she started opposing the regime’s systematic use of torture and sexualised violence towards political prisoners, particularly ladies, that’s practised in Iranian prisons.
Final yr’s wave of protests turned identified to the political prisoners held contained in the infamous Evin jail in Tehran. As soon as once more, Ms Mohammadi assumed management. From jail she expressed assist for the demonstrators and organised solidarity actions amongst her fellow inmates. The jail authorities responded by imposing even stricter circumstances. Ms Mohammadi was prohibited from receiving calls and guests. She nonetheless managed to smuggle out an article which the New York Occasions printed on the one-year anniversary of Mahsa Jina Amini’s killing. The message was: “The extra of us they lock up, the stronger we develop into.” From captivity, Ms Mohammadi has helped to make sure that the protests haven’t ebbed out.
Narges Mohammadi is a girl, a human rights advocate, and a freedom fighter. In awarding her this yr’s Nobel Peace Prize, the Norwegian Nobel Committee needs to honour her brave combat for human rights, freedom, and democracy in Iran. This yr’s Peace Prize additionally recognises the a whole bunch of 1000’s of people that, within the previous yr, have demonstrated towards the theocratic regime’s insurance policies of discrimination and oppression concentrating on ladies. Solely by embracing equal rights for all can the world obtain the fraternity between nations that Alfred Nobel sought to advertise. The award to Narges Mohammadi follows an extended custom by which the Norwegian Nobel Committee has awarded the Peace Prize to these working to advance social justice, human rights, and democracy. These are vital preconditions for lasting peace.
In a letter from Evin jail, 22 of Narges Mohammadi’s fellow political prisoners hailed the Peace Prize award “honoring her years of exercise for the conclusion of freedom and equality and elevating the voice of Iranian society’s calls for and rights” and known as it a step in direction of better enlightenment. Their letter states, “We’re pleased with our sister and comrade-in-arms Narges, who gave shade to the Nobel Peace Prize within the first yr of the Jina motion (Mehsa Amini). The pink shade of the shed blood, which is the warmth of the moms of the petitioners, has been engraved on the symbol of the 2023 Nobel Peace Prize.”
The Islamic Republic has in the meantime condemned the awarding of the Nobel Peace Prize to a fighter towards it. A variety of officers within the Islamic Republic, with out mentioning Narges Mohammadi, expressed their anger over awarding the Nobel Peace Prize to this well-known human rights activist. And in one of many first official reactions of the federal government of the Islamic Republic of Iran to the Nobel Peace Prize award, Iran’s International Minister tweeted that assassinated Iranian navy officer Qassem Soleimani is “essentially the most worthy image of world peace”.
The award of the Nobel Peace Prize to Narges Mohammadi will deepen worldwide legitimacy and international consciousness of the wrestle of the opponents of the “Islamic Republic” to finish political tyranny and set up a secular and democratic political system in Iran. Narges Mohammadi has signed a number of statements throughout her three a long time of political wrestle. To any extent further, each time she places her signature on an announcement, that textual content will develop into one signed by a “Nobel Peace Prize laureate” and this can trigger that textual content to get broader wider worldwide consideration. Many elites, politicians and observers will observe her feedback extra significantly than earlier than.
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