British-Iranian mother of one-year-old girl detained without charge in Iran

A British-Iranian mother and charity worker has been detained by the Iranian regime's Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps (IRGC), separated from her one-year-old baby daughter and held without charge in solitary confinement.

The family of charity worker Nazanin Zaghari-Ratcliffe, 37, is issuing an urgent appeal for British Prime Minister David Cameron to overturn her “outrageous and arbitrary” detention, The Independent reported on Monday.

Ms Zaghari-Ratcliffe’s British passport was confiscated, along with that of her baby, Gabriella, when she tried to return to London after a two-week holiday visiting family in Tehran.

After being stopped at the check-in desk on April 3, she was transported to an unknown detention facility some 1,000 km away in Kerman Province, the report said.

Speaking to The Independent, her British husband Richard Ratcliffe said his wife was being interrogated daily and had been given no access to a lawyer or to see her daughter, who is being cared for by her grandparents. The family understands she has been made to sign a confession under duress, but does not know its contents.

Iran: Honor killing – Father kills her newly-wed daughter with shovel

Iran: Honor killing – Father kills her newly-wed daughter with shovel

A man beat up her 15-year-old newly-wed daughter with the handle of the shovel in a bid to punish and dissuade the girl from divorcing her husband, but ended up killing her.

The murderer father confessed: "I was mad at my daughter. So, I picked the handle of the shovel and beat her up so much that she was wounded. I wanted to force her to stay with her husband. At midnight, she felt really bad and before we could do anything, she died." (State-run TNews.ir website, January 19, 2016)

The statics show that forcible marriage of under-age girls in Iran is on the rise as sanctioned by the law.

Iran: Letter to my imprisoned daughter

Athena Daemi’s

AthenaDaemi’s  mother wrote a letter to her daughter, a political prisoner, after being in prison for one year.

Daemi was arrested at her father’s home on October 21, 2014 and was transferred to ward 2A of Evin Prison in Tehran.

She has been accused of “propaganda against the state”, “insulting the leader”, “assembly and collusion to commit crimes against national security”.

Masoumeh Ne’mati, Atena’s mother, wrote:

One year passed without you…

It has been one year that I am fighting with every heartbeat, worried it might stop… and I don’t know how many more days it will endure.

Maki Mandela: Global support exists for Mrs. Rajavi’s movement

Maki Mandela

Phumla Makaziwe Mandela, a women’s rights advocate and daughter of the late South African leader Nelson Mandela, has urged the people of Iran to continue their fight to achieve freedom and democracy.

Dr. Maki Mandela made the remarks at a major conference in Paris on human rights in Iran on October 10 on the occasion of the World Day Against the Death Penalty.

Addressing the people of Iran, Dr. Mandela said: "All I say to you is do not lose hope, stay with hope and resilience, and hope in a greater power, and you will succeed eventually in your fight against evil."

"No death penalty can prevent a good idea whose time has come."