An Iranian journalist who conducted an interview with Mahsa Amini’s father has made allegations of sexual assault during her arrest. An audio message has emerged, indicating that she is currently undertaking a hunger strike while detained in prison. Various Persian media outlets and human rights organizations have published this audio message.
Following her publication of an interview with Amjad Amini, the father of Mahsa Amini, journalist Nazila Maroufian, aged 23, has become a target for Iranian authorities.
Human rights organizations claim that Iranian authorities have escalated their already rigorous crackdown to forestall a potential surge of protests as the one-year anniversary of Mahsa Amini’s tragic demise approaches.
Mahsa Amini tragically passed away while in the custody of Iran’s morality police in September of the previous year. Her arrest had been prompted by her attire being deemed ‘inappropriate.’ Her death in custody had sparked widespread protests across Iran, with some even calling for the overthrow of the country’s clerical regime.
Maroufian, who has reportedly been detained four times in recent months, was most recently apprehended in Tehran on August 30.
In an audio message from Tehran’s Evin prison, which was published by international media outlets such as Iran International and Radio Farda, as well as by the Kurdistan Human Rights Network (KHRN) and the Center for Human Rights in Iran (CHRI), Maroufian disclosed, “I was sexually assaulted in a situation where I was in the worst possible state.” She asserted that her hunger strike was a protest against her own situation and that of all women subjected to violence in police stations and prisons.
“This strike is for me but is also for all the women in dire conditions in Iran,” she emphasized in her message, which appeared to have been recorded during a phone call to her family, who also shared images of the bruises she had allegedly sustained during the assault.
Earlier this week, media reports indicated that Maroufian had been sentenced to one year in prison on charges of “spreading propaganda” against the Islamic system in the country.
After her previous releases from custody, Maroufian exhibited defiance by posting pictures of herself without a headscarf, in protest against the stringent dress code imposed on women.
Iran has responded harshly to domestic reporting on the Amini case. The two women journalists who helped bring this story to the world’s attention have been in Evin prison for nearly a year following their arrest in September.
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