Nasrin Sotoudeh, a prominent writer, human rights lawyer and activist, was abruptly re-arrested on June thirteen, 2018, and taken to Evin prison house. Her arrest came shortly after her legal support and advancement for women who were facing charges for peacefully protesting Iran's compulsory hijab law, including criticism of Iranian judicial procedures limiting defendants' access to a lawyer in security-related cases. The charges against her were initially unclear, though later revealed to be for "propaganda confronting the state and assembly and collusion to act confronting national security."  On March 6, 2019,  Sotoudeh was convicted of several national security-related offenses in absentia, after her refusal to attend the trial earlier Tehran's Islamic Revolutionary Court since she could not select her ain counsel. On March xi, 2019, it was reported past Reza Khandan, Sotoudeh'southward husband, that she was sentenced to 33 years in prison and 148 lashes, equally well as beingness denied access to a copy of the verdict confronting her for no credible reason. Her married man clarified later that in accordance with Iranian constabulary, Sotoudeh will only serve the longest sentence for one of the convictions against her, which is 10 years. Notwithstanding, another ii and a half years were added due to the high number of charges against her, raising her total sentence to effectually 12 years. Sotoudeh has been granted medical furlough multiple times since she entered prison. However, her 46-day hunger strike—which ended on September 24, 2022 due to her severely deteriorating status–is still impacting her health.

Sotoudeh is the winner of the 2011 PEN/Barbara Goldsmith Freedom to Write Award and a co-winner of the European Parliament's 2012 Sakharov Prize. She had previously been released from Evin Prison on September 18, 2013.

PEN America Advocacy

May 27, 2021: PEN America—in collaboration with Robert F. Kennedy Human Rights, Amnesty International United states, and the makers of the documentary moving-picture show Nasrin —nowadays " #FreeNasrinandLoujain: Virtual Reading of Women Writers at Hazard around the World ," featuring writing past Nasrin Sotoudeh and 5 other women author-activists. Their works are read by emerging women's rights activists.

Feb 23, 2021: PEN America publishes a letter to the Secretary-General of the United Nations on behalf of Nasrin Sotoudeh, who remains imprisoned. In her letter, Sotoudeh protests the unjust executions of religious and ethnic minority members in Iran and asks the United Nations and the international community to take action against this organisation.

Dec 21, 2020: PEN America co-hosts a virtual event with Ms. Magazine to mark the theatrical release of the documentary flick NASRIN. Introduced past Karin Deutsch Karlekar of PEN America and moderated by New York Times columnist Nicholas Kristof, the effect focused on Iranian women's movements and Nasrin Sotoudeh's activism, equally discussed by panelists man rights advocate Kerry Kennedy, Iranian artist and activist Parastou Forouhar, and NASRIN filmmakers Jeff Kaufman and Marcia Ross. Statements of solidarity from writer Margaret Atwood and Ms. Sotoudeh's husband Reza Khandan rounded out the program.

Dec 2, 2020:PEN America releases a joint open alphabetic character with the Raoul Wallenberg Center for Human being Rights, the International Bar Clan's Human being Rights Found, and the Center for Human being Rights in Islamic republic of iran to Iranian Supreme Leader Ayatollah Khamenei to quash the unjust conviction and sentence confronting Sotoudeh, as well as the awaiting judgement confronting her husband, Reza Khandan.

September 2020 : PEN America calls for the release of Nasrin Sotoudeh in a widely-circulated public petition after she began her hunger strike on August 11 to protest Iranian prison house atmospheric condition amid the COVID-19 pandemic.

March 11, 2019: PEN releases a statement equally she is sentenced to a combined 38 years in prison and 148 lashes. In the statement, PEN calls on the Iranian government to uphold the due process rights of human rights activists, to clarify the exact terms of this horrific verdict, and to immediately and unconditionally exonerate and release Nasrin Sotoudeh.

March 6, 2019: Upon the news alleging that Sotoudeh is sentenced to 34 years in prison house and 148 lashes based on unspecified charges, PEN America releases a statement, describing Sotoudeh'due south alleged conviction as a "grave miscarriage of justice."

June xviii, 2018: PEN America calls for the immediate and unconditional release of the Iranian human rights lawyer, as she was arrested and detained on June 13 at her abode in Tehran, where she was informed she would be serving a five-year sentence afterward being bedevilled in absentia.

October twenty, 2014: PEN expresses concern over the news that Sotoudeh is once over again barred from practicing constabulary for 3 years, insisting that she be returned her legally granted license to practise law.

Apr 18, 2014: PEN America revisits Nasrin Sotoudeh's instance equally office of its 'Freedom to Write Retrospective.' In a blog post, PEN explains the instances in which she was arrested or targeted by the Iranian government, at the aforementioned time drawing attention to her human rights work.

March 7, 2014: PEN America expresses back up for women at risk who bravely fight for free expression, including Nasrin Sotoudeh, at the eve of International Women's Day.

September 18, 2013: PEN America welcomes the release of Nasrin Sotoudeh. She had been serving a six-yr sentence in Tehran'due south notorious Evin Prison on anti-state charges for comments she gave the media in defence force of her clients.

January 22, 2013: PEN America calls for the release of Sotoudeh upon her return to Even Prison afterward a three day furlough. PEN America welcomed her temporary release on January 17, 2013 when she was temporarily released.

October 25, 2012: PEN America joins PEN International expressing concern for the health of the writer, journalist and lawyer Sotoudeh and calls for her immediate and unconditional release.

Apr 30, 2011: PEN America honors Sotoudeh with the 2011 PEN/Barbara Goldsmith Freedom to Write Award.

CASE BACKGROUND

Nasrin Sotoudeh is well-known for taking on high-contour political cases. She began her activism in 1991 as the just female writer for the nationalist-religious publicationDaricheh Goftegoo; one of her first projects was to fix a series of interviews, reports, and articles on Iranian women to mark International Women'southward Day, all of which her editor refused to run. After completing her Master'south Caste in International Law at Shahid Beheshti University, Sotoudeh passed the bar exam in 1995 but was not permitted to practice police force for another eight years. She concentrated on journalism instead, writing for several reformist newspapers, includingJame'due east.

When Sotoudeh was finally granted a constabulary license in 2003, she specialized in women's and children'southward rights while continuing to write manufactures addressing these issues. Her clients have included women's rights activists, amongst them the organizers of the grassroots, door-to-door One Million Signatures Campaign; journalists such as Eisa Sharkhiz; politicians such as Hashmat Tabarzadi, caput of Iran's banned opposition group the Democratic Front; and legal colleagues such as Nobel Peace Prize laureate Shirin Ebadi. She has represented many Iranian opposition activists arrested in the crackdown following the June 12, 2009, presidential elections.

She has as well boldly dedicated prisoners sentenced to decease for crimes committed while they were under xviii. Sotoudeh has recently worked equally a defense attorney for women charged with violating Iran'due south compulsory veiling law. During an outbreak of protests in December 2022 and January 2018, a number of women participating in the Girls of Revolution Street Protest were arrested for removing their headscarves in public to demonstrate against the mandatory dress code. Article 638 of Islamic republic of iran's penal code mandates that women who appear in public places or roads without wearing the hijab will be sentenced to prison time, corporal punishment, or fines.

In addition to defending women who were arrested for protesting Islamic republic of iran's compulsory hijab law, Sotoudeh is also known for her criticism of the judiciary'south decision to force detainees facing politically motivated charges to cull their counsel from a listing of lawyers approved by the judiciary. She criticized the new amendment, indicating that it 'non simply undermines due process rights, it also undermines lawyers' independence.'

Officials from all over the earth, including the U.s. and the European union, have called for Sotoudeh'due south release. PEN America and other international and Iranian non-governmental organizations have called the abort an attack on freedom of voice communication and human rights activism.

Instance UPDATES

July 22, 2021: Sotoudeh is released from prison on another temporary medical furlough. In June, one month prior, twelve UN human rights experts had condemned the ongoing imprisonment of Sotoudeh amidst the COVID-19 pandemic, need her immediate release from prison house, and call on the Iranian authorities to stop their harassment of Sotoudeh's family unit.

March 17, 2021: Authorities release Sotoudeh from prison house on a two-week leave to celebrate the Iranian New year (Nowruz), but she is returned to prison at the terminate of her allow.

January 20, 2021: Sotoudeh is abruptly forced to return to Qarchak prison house subsequently undergoing an angioplasty. In a continued pattern of harassment, the authorities freeze her family's bank accounts.

January 8, 2021: Nasrin is granted a 3-twenty-four hour period medical furlough in social club to keep her treatment, equally was previously brash by medical professionals.

Dec 2, 2020: Iranian government order Sotoudeh to return to Qarchak prison, against the communication of a medical professional person and despite her contraction of COVID-19 afterward coming into contact with prison guards afflicted with the virus. A medical professional recommended instead that Sotoudeh, recovering from the physical toll of a 46-twenty-four hour period hunger strike and the contraction of COVID-xix, remain on medical furlough for another 2 weeks.

Nov 7, 2020: Islamic republic of iran's judiciary news website Mizan announces that Sotoudeh is released on medical furlough "with the approval of the prosecutor presiding over women's prison." Sotoudeh'due south hubby Reza Khandan confirms on Twitter that Sotoudeh had been conditionally released.

October twenty, 2020: Judiciary officials in Iran transfer Nasrin Sotoudeh to Qarchak prison, described equally "Islamic republic of iran's most dangerous for women," instead of the hospital, where officers at Evin prison claimed they were taking her. Nasrin Sotoudeh's husband discloses in a tweet that specialists had recommended she undergo a eye examination and angiography.

October one, 2020: The Right to Livelihood Foundation honors Nasrin Sotoudeh with the Correct to Livelihood Honour. Sotoudeh is honored "for her fearless activism, at great personal chance, to promote political freedoms and human rights in Iran."

September 25, 2020: Sotoudeh ends her hunger strike due to her severely deteriorating health. Sotoudeh went 46 days without nutrient, 5 of which she spent in the cardiac intendance unit of Taleghani hospital, to protest the connected detention of political prisoners in Iran during the COVID-xix pandemic. Sotoudeh's husband, Reza Khandan, relays her announcement via Twitter the following twenty-four hours.

September 23, 2020: Authorities return Sotoudeh to Evin prison house without further medical intendance, later on several days in the cardiac care unit of measurement in Taleghani infirmary. Interviewed past AFP, husband Reza Khandan expresses concern for her lack of medical care in prison house, saying, "Because of her eye issues, I expected them to at to the lowest degree refer her to the prison clinic, particularly after 44 days on hunger strike."

September 20, 2020: More than than 40 days into her hunger strike, Nasrin Sotoudeh is hospitalized and taken to the cardiac intendance unit of Taleghani infirmary in Tehran. The prison house reportedly did not notify Sotoudeh's family about her hospitalization; a fellow inmate notified them. Husband Reza Khandan told AFP, "Nosotros were immune to run across her for a few moments," and added that "She was severely weakened, lost a lot of weight and had sunken eyes."

August 17, 2020: State security forces arrest Sotoudeh's 20-year-onetime girl and take her to Evin Security Court on charges that she had assaulted a female person officer during prior visitation at Evin Prison house. Sotoudeh's hubby, Reza Khandan, believes the arrest is another intimidation tactic in a series used confronting Sotoudeh's family unit in retaliation for her public advocacy. Sotoudeh's girl is subsequently released on bail.

August xi, 2020: Nasrin begins a hunger strike in protestation of the unjust living weather condition in Tehran's Evin Prison, where COVID-19 has spread, in connected detention of prisoners eligible for release. In a letter written by Sotoudeh, she calls for rightful legal recourse to appeal imprisonments and the release of political prisoners.

July 27, 2020: Sotoudeh's hubby, Reza Khandan, announces that the banking company accounts of Sotoudeh and her family in Tehran accept been frozen since May on orders of the Prosecutor's Office. All efforts past Khandan to unblock the accounts have been unsuccessful, and the family unit remains unable to access their funds.

March 16, 2020: Sotoudeh announces in a argument that she will keep hunger strike to protest the continued custody of political prisoners during the COVID-19 pandemic. She argues in her statement from Evin Prison that state government are keeping these prisoners incarcerated until the "horrors of this wellness crisis spread to their lives and impact their families, as well."

March 6, 2020: In honor of International Women's Solar day, Nasrin Sotoudeh pens an essay from Evin Prison, published in Time magazine. In information technology, she calls for peace, and for the Iranian authorities to "to end their antagonism with the world, to look at the world through the eyes of peace and to trust life and human beings."

February iii, 2020: Nominated past students, Nasrin Sotoudeh receives an honorary doctorate from KU Leuven, a inquiry university in Belgium as office of their Patron'due south Day Celebrations.

January 2020: Queen's University in Ontario, Canada awards Nasrin Sotoudeh an honorary doctorate in absentia to honor her work and demonstrate "support for her and the Iranian people." Only every bit awards from educational institutions and rights advocacy groups, including PEN, stimulated dialogue around Sotoudeh's previous abort and helped secure her 2013 release, Queen'south University hopes that the awarding of an honorary doctorate tin can once again bring Sotoudeh's case to global attending.

March 11, 2019: According to reports, Nasrin Sotoudeh tells her husband, Reza Khandan, she is sentenced to 38 years in prison house and 148 lashes and that it should be reported as such although the sentence may be reduced later. The Iranian media initially reports that she is sentenced to seven years in prison, quoting a statement of an Iranian judge. Khandan further tells to the CHRI that her judgement is based on 7 different charges mentioned below.

March five, 2019: Sotoudeh is reportedly bedevilled on multiple charges just her sentence in writing has non been issued yet. Co-ordinate to news reports, the charges for which she has been bedevilled are non yet clear, but the charges she was facing since her abort in June 2022 could consequence in imprisonment upwardly to 34 years and 148 lashes. These charges are, "associates and bunco against national security," "propaganda against the state," "membership in the Defenders of Human being Rights Center, the Legam group [against uppercase punishment], and the National Peace Council," "encouraging corruption and prostitution," "appearing at the judiciary without Islamic hijab," "disturbing public peace and society" and "publishing falsehoods with the intent to disturb public stance."

January 22, 2019: Sotoudeh's husband Reza Khandan and another activist, Farhad Meysami, are sentenced to six years in prison and banned from leaving the land or engaging in online activities for two years for protesting the mandatory hijab law in Islamic republic of iran. They are both convicted of "assembly and collusion against national security" and "propaganda against the country." Khandan tells the Middle for Human being Rights in Iran (CHRI) that they were sentenced unlawfully in the absence of a public trial and without due procedure.

December 30, 2018: Sotoudeh is reportedly tried in absentia in Tehran. She allegedly refuses to announced in court because she is denied the correct to choose her own lawyer and wanted to protest the unjust judicial process.

December 28, 2018: Reza Khandan, Sotoudeh's husband, is released on bail.

Dec 13, 2018: The European Parliament adopts a resolution by 552 votes in favor, and half dozen against, with 38 abstentions, calling on Iranian authorities to immediately and unconditionally release Sotoudeh, to "ensure the right of all defendants to a legal counsel of their choice in all courtroom cases without undue limitations, and to a fair trial, in line with Iran's international commitments under the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights," as well as "ensure the due procedure rights of all citizens detained in Islamic republic of iran and to grant them a fair trial."

September 4, 2018: Reza Khandan, Sotoudeh'due south husband, is arrested and taken to the Office of the Prosecutor in Tehran'south Evin Prison, where he is charged with "spreading propaganda against the organisation" and "colluding to commit crimes against national security," after posting several updates virtually his wife's June 2022 arrest online.

Baronial 2018:Iii agents from Iran's Intelligence Ministryraid her family's home while her children are asleep, every bit well every bit the business firm of her sister-in-law. "They came into the house at eight in the forenoon when the kids were sleeping and turned everything upside down," Sotoudeh's husbandtold the Center for Human Rights in Islamic republic of iran (CHRI). "They took away some things, like pins that had 'I'1000 Against Forced Hijab' written on them."

This kind of harassment has intensified since her arrest in June: the raid was ane prime case of the means the regime has tried to intimidate Sotoudeh's family unit and supporters. In response to her arrest and the continued harassment of her family, Sotoudehbegins a hunger strike in Evin prison house.

June 17, 2018: To protest Sotoudeh'due south arrest, her husband Reza Khandan and defense lawyers Arash Keykhosravi and Payam Derafshan, likewise as several ceremonious rights activists, gathered outside the gates of Evin Prison. Security agentstrounce the protesters and detained ix of them for several hours. Keykhosravi and Derafshan, besides as 2 other protesters, "received a lot of injuries," Khandan reported.

June 13, 2018: Sotoudeh isre-arrested and detained at her home in Tehran, where she is informed she has been sentenced to five years in prison after being convicted in absentia. She had recently criticized the country'south judiciary and was apparently planning a sit-in to protest recent restrictions on defendants' ability to hire contained lawyers in national security cases when she was arrested, according tonews reports. In protestation of the new rule, she has reportedly refused to hire a defense attorney for herself. She has toodeclined to post bond in protest of the charges against her.

Sotoudeh's married man, Reza Khandan,told the Center for Human Rights in Islamic republic of iran (CHRI) that she was informed during interrogation that she is charged with "propaganda against the state" and "assembly and collusion" for supposedly colluding with her client,Shaparak Shajarizadeh, at the Kashan courthouse. Ms. Shajarizadeh, 1 of Sotoudeh's clients, was arrested for removing her headscarf in public. According to Mr. Khandan, these accusations are completely baseless as Sotoudeh was unable to see Ms. Shajarizadeh in Kashan when she was arrested because she was in Tehran, 152 miles abroad. Mr. Khandan besides reports that Sotoudeh is considering joining the hijab protests by removing her headscarf in prison to protest her own abort.

June 2015: Her license to practice law is reinstated.

December 10, 2014: On Human Rights Twenty-four hours and the 50th twenty-four hours of her sit down-in, Sotoudeh is once more arrested and detained, but released hours afterwards.

Oct 25, 2014: She is arrested and detained at a demonstration whileprotesting a contempo string of acid attacks confronting women, and released several hours later.

October eighteen, 2014: Co-operative 2 of the Lawyers' Disciplinary Court at the Iranian Bar Association bans Sotoudeh from her constabulary practice for three years. On October 21, Sotoudeh begins asit-in in front of the Bar Association to protest the ruling banning her from her police practice.

September 18, 2013: She is released from Evin Prison, on the eve of President Rouhani's showtime visit to the U.s.a.. Previously, Sotoudeh had been released for short visits with her family.

December iv, 2012: Sotoudeh ends her hunger strike after government lift the travel ban on her daughter. Her husband reports that she had lived entirely on salt water and sugar water and that her weight had dropped to only 95 pounds. She spent 17 days in solitary confinement every bit penalization for her hunger strike only was somewhen returned to Ward 209 of Evin Prison.

Oct 17, 2012: Sotoudeh goes on ahunger strike to protest her prison conditions and a travel ban placed on her 12-yr-onetime daughter Mehraveh.

September 2011: An appeals court reduces Sotoudeh's sentence from xi years to 6, and her ban from working as a lawyer is reduced from 20 to 10. The ban is afterward reduced to iii years and and so nine months. Since nine months of the suspension had already passed by and so, her license is finer reinstated.

January 9, 2011: Branch 26 of the Revolutionary Courtroomsentences Sotoudeh to a full of 11 years in prison—one year for "spreading lies against the country," five years for "acting against national security," and some other five years for "cooperating with the Center for Man Rights Defenders." The court too bans her from practicing police and from leaving the country for 20 years after leaving prison house.

September 4, 2010: She is summoned to special court at Evin prison, and arrested on charges of "spreading lies confronting the state," "cooperating with the Center of Human Rights Defenders," and "conspiracy to disturb order." She was denied admission to her lawyer and was restricted family visits for the first several months of her detention. Iran's Secretary of the High Council for Human being Rights, Mohammad Javad Larijani,claimed that Sotoudeh's prosecution was not "due to her being a lawyer," simply because of her interviews in defense of her clients who had been arrested during the June 2009 crackdown, which Larijani labeled as "propaganda against the state." In improver to the accuse for interviews she gave with the media, she is believed to have been charged for a recorded acceptance speech, never shown in Iran, thanking the International Homo Rights Organization of Italian republic for awarding her its Human Rights Prize in 2008, during which she did not wear a headscarf. Sotoudeh was barred from leaving Islamic republic of iran to accept the award personally.

Baronial 29, 2010: Security officers raid Sotoudeh's home, confiscating several of her files and documents.

FREE EXPRESSION IN IRAN

Iran is among the world'southward worst complimentary expression offenders. Hundreds of journalists are currently imprisoned on politically-motivated charges in Islamic republic of iran alongside scores of other writers, bloggers, artists, homo rights defenders, and other political prisoners. President Hassan Rouhani pledged to initiate liberal reforms and to ameliorate Iran's free speech record during his ballot campaign but has thus far failed to deliver positive results. Iran remains notorious for a judicial system completely defective in transparency, which is guilty of numerous capricious arrests and i of the world's highest rates ofcapital penalisation. Man rights organizations report that political prisoners are frequently kept in solitary solitude, restricted from connecting with their families for long periods of time.

IN THEIR WORDS

After her release from Evin Prison in 2013, Sotoudehsaid toThe New Yorker, "I was released but I was non freed. For me, this sort of freedom is meaningless when my friends are all the same in prison."

During her first imprisonment, Sotoudehwrote a letter to her married man, which he shared on Facebook in 2014. "My dear Reza, everyone ponders most their liberty while in prison," she reflected. "Although my liberty is also of import to me, it is not more than important than the justice that has been ignored and denied . . . . Nothing is more than important than those hundreds of years of sentences that were rendered to my clients and other freedom-seeking individuals, accused of crimes they had not committed."