Five Prisoners Are Awarded Forty Five Years of Prison

Family members of the five political prisoners who recently received sentences of 45 years of prison declared their protests against the heavy and unprecedented judgments.

Mehr Ali Bigloo, Latif Hassani, Mahmud Fazli, Behbood Gholizadeh and Shahram Radmehr belonged to a group known as the Reawakening National Movement for Southern Azerbaijan and each was sentenced to nine years of prison for belonging to an illegal organization and engaging in propaganda against the regime.

Speaking exclusively to Rooz, Sona Farajzadeh, Mehr Ali BIgloo’s wife said that her husband and Latif Hassani had been arrested on the same charges in 2010, were tried and received prison sentences. She acknowledged that the group did not have a license and that the prisoners were released after which they changed the name of the group and wrote up a charter and launched efforts to get a license. But in the process they were arrested again.

But she also said that since the release of the members, they had not engaged in any activity other than those related to getting a permit and writing their charter.

Farajzadeh explained that until recently all 5 prisoners were not allowed visitations and needed special permission from the public prosecutor for this. Now they have monthly visits, she added.

She elaborated that her husband had spent seven months in solitary confinement and then another two months in the general ward before he was released the first time. “When she was arrested the second time, we thought they were going to have him serve the remaining of his 1.5 year sentence. Instead, they charged him against and sent him to trial for actins that he had already been tried and for which he had already seen prison.”

Azam Piri, Latif Hassani’s wife also spoke with Rooz and called her husband’s case unprecedented because he was tried and sentenced for the same charges for which he had already seen prison. According to her, the prosecutor had first told her that her husband had committed new unlawful actions, but when we saw the charge sheet, the list was the same as the old one. She said her husband was not doing well health wise and needed medical care. He had been a teacher at a high school but was barred from continuing his higher education, after the first prison incident.

Fatemeh Heydari, Mr. Fazli’s wife told Rooz that her family thought that her husband was arrested and would be serving the rest of his previous prison term. But as it turned out, they retried him for the same charges and issued a new 9 year prison sentence against him. His previous arrest was in relation to the situation with the Orumie Lake for which he had been acquitted.

Shahram Radmehr who was arrested in Meshkin Shahr in connection with the group was also tried and given a 9 year sentence.