One in every of Iran’s most outstanding human rights advocates is warning that the Iranian authorities is utilizing the aftermath of its 12-day battle with Israel to escalate repression towards its personal residents — notably political and civil activists.
Nobel Peace Prize laureate Narges Mohammadi, in a video message to ABC Information, warned {that a} surge in executions and widespread arrests for the reason that battle started exhibits that the regime is utilizing the second to deflect from many years of alleged repression and failed coverage, with the goal to “unfold concern and terror.”
“We are actually witnessing the intensification of the battle between the Islamic Republic and the folks of Iran — a battle that is been occurring for 46 years,” Mohammadi mentioned.
Whereas Iranian authorities have publicly celebrated what they name a “victory” over Israel, Mohammadi rejects that declare.
“I merely do not imagine this,” she mentioned. “Conflict weakens the very instruments wanted to realize human rights and democracy — like civil society. I imagine that with the Islamic Republic nonetheless in energy after this battle, our work and our struggle have now develop into much more troublesome.”
She warned that the regime, “now weakened,” has tightened its grip on civil liberties, turning on alleged traitors from inside.
Iranian authorities, whereas acknowledging injury to elements of their nuclear amenities and infrastructure, insist they continue to be robust and unified. State-affiliated media have framed the latest wave of arrests and executions as essential measures to guard nationwide safety, alleging infiltration and espionage linked to Israel’s Mossad intelligence company.
Nobel laureate Narges Mohammadi is seen on this picture from a video message to ABC Information.
ABC Information
Mohammadi spoke from her residence in Tehran, the place she is defying a authorities order to return to Iran’s infamous Evin Jail following pressing, life-saving surgical procedure. Mohammadi, who’s serving a 13-year, 9-month sentence, was granted a medical furlough from the jail, the place lots of the nation’s dissidents and political prisoners are held.
She and different activists have expressed explicit concern over the situation and destiny of Evin’s prisoners following Israel’s June 23 missile strike on the power. In accordance with Iran’s judiciary spokesperson, no less than 71 folks have been killed within the strike, which the United Nations Human Rights Workplace condemned as a “gross violation” of worldwide legislation. Israeli Protection Minister Israel Katz mentioned Israel hit “regime targets and businesses of presidency repression” throughout Tehran, together with Evin.
Whereas Mohammadi additionally condemned the strike, she warned that what has adopted might pose a fair better human rights risk.
Mohammadi, who was on furlough on the time of the assault, instructed ABC Information she has spoken extensively with prisoners and their households.
“After the assault, the state of affairs inside Evin grew to become extraordinarily securitized,” mentioned Mohammadi, who all instructed has been handed greater than 36 years of jail time on a number of fees together with committing “propaganda exercise towards the state” and “collusion towards state safety” — vaguely outlined nationwide safety offenses generally utilized by authorities to criminalize peaceable dissent.
“Prisoner transfers are actually occurring below closely militarized circumstances.” Mohammadi mentioned, “with full sniper protection [and prisoners] shackled with each handcuffs and leg irons.”
On this image obtained from the Iranian Mizan Information Company on June 25, 2025, rescuers sift via the rubble inside within the Evin jail complicated in Tehran, Iran, that was by an Israeli strike.
Mostafa Roudaki/mizanonline/AFP by way of Getty Photographs
Following days of uncertainty, Iran’s Prisons Group introduced that detainees had been transferred to different prisons throughout Tehran Province. State media reported that many have been moved to amenities together with Qarchak Jail and Higher Tehran Jail.
“The state of affairs inside each prisons is extraordinarily worrying,” Mohammadi mentioned, describing the transferred inmates as “war-affected detainees” now subjected to what she known as “extreme repression.”
A supply near the households of a number of political prisoners, who requested that their identify not be used because of concern of reprisals, instructed ABC Information that circumstances in Qarchak Jail are “insufferable” and “akin to torture,” citing overcrowding, a scarcity of meals and consuming water, poor sanitation, and inadequate entry to fundamental requirements.
Three political prisoners — Golrokh Iraee, Reyhaneh Ansari and Varisheh Moradi — issued a joint assertion from Qarchak Jail, saying, “We don’t think about right this moment’s struggling of our personal to be better than the struggling imposed on the folks of Iran.”
Mohammadi instructed ABC Information that she is asking for renewed worldwide scrutiny of Iran’s remedy of its personal residents.
“I imagine our state of affairs has develop into much more harmful for the folks than it was earlier than the battle, and we should broaden our human rights actions,” she mentioned. “I hope worldwide human rights organizations will refocus their particular and explicit consideration on the repressions now being carried out in Iran after the battle — together with the problem of arrests, prisons, torture, pressured confessions, after which the executions.”
Mohammadi additionally warned that primarily based on “clear proof and studies,” she expects that the federal government’s crackdown on civil society, notably younger folks and activists, is prone to “develop into much more extreme” within the coming days.
Regardless of the regime’s efforts to silence dissent, Mohammadi mentioned she stays dedicated to her activism, at the same time as strain mounts on her, her household, and pals. A member of her assist group instructed ABC Information that she has acquired repeated telephone calls demanding her return to jail, and that intelligence brokers have summoned, interrogated, and harassed her family and friends in what seems to be an effort to isolate her.
Her group additionally says Iranian monetary authorities issued an official order to grab Mohammadi’s Nobel Peace Prize award cash — 17 billion toman or roughly USD $400,000 — echoing an analogous tactic used towards fellow Nobel laureate Shirin Ebadi in 2009.
“I need to see an finish to the Islamic Republic — a repressive, theocratic, and authoritarian system that’s misogynistic, unreformable, and basically dysfunctional,” Mohammadi’s mentioned. “However I’m towards battle — as a result of it drains the energy and capability of the Iranian folks, civil society, and pro-democracy activists.”
Nonetheless, she stays hopeful.
“For many years, we have been combating for freedom, democracy, and equality — enduring repression, imprisonment, executions, and torture. However we have by no means backed down,” she mentioned. “Till the day democracy is achieved — I can’t cease.”
