Jailed Dissident Student Activist on Trial Again

Dissident Iranian student activist, Abdullah Momeni was jailed shortly after the election coup in Iran, in 2009. As well as a student spokesperson, Momeni also headed Karroubi's Free Citizen HQ.

He was sentenced to 4 years and 11 months prison and is currently serving his sentence in section 350 of Evin prison. Momeni has not been permitted to have his wife and children visit him in jail for the last 16 months. Prison authorities are also denying him medical treatments for his dermatological problems and hearing damage he has suffered since his incarceration in prison.

In September last year, Abdullah Momeni, managed to smuggle out an open letter addressed to the Supreme Leader, Ayatollah Khamenei. See the translation of the letter, published in EA, here

In the letter to Ayatollah Khamenei, Momeni was hoping that the treatment of prisoners of conscience in Iran may move the ageing Supreme Leader and says 'I decided to write a letter addressed to you, thinking that perhaps the news about detention centers does not reach you.'

Ten months after writing that open letter, not only the ageing Supreme Tyrant was not moved by what was happening to the best sons and daughters of Iran in jails, but instead Momeni now faces another trial for having dared to write that letter! Only in the Islamic Republic of Iran, writing a letter to the authorities in order to seek a more humane treatment for prisoners of conscience by a prisoner of conscience would result in the jailed person to face another trial.

The Supreme Leader has now proven beyond any doubt, that he is fully aware of the human rights abuses in Iran and that he himself is the Supreme Tyrant and the root cause of all the injustices in Iran.

Abdulla Momeni's brother was martyred in the war against Saddam. He voluntarily returned to the front after he recovered from an injury. As well as his own children, Abdullah also looked after his martyred brother's daughter.