Iran: Death Sentence of Political Prisoner Manouchehr Fallah Upheld on Charges of Membership in the PMOI
Harassment and Denial of Medical Care for Roozbeh Alipour in Ghezel Hesar Prison
Fabricated Case and Retrial of Political Prisoner Forough Taghipour
In early May, the kangaroo court in Rasht, presided over by executioner Ahmad Darvish-Goftar, once again upheld the death sentence of political prisoner Manouchehr Fallah on charges of membership in the People’s Mojahedin Organization of Iran (PMOI/MEK). Previously, the regime’s Supreme Court had referred the review of Manouchehr’s case back to this court. Thirty-six-year-old Manouchehr Fallah was arrested in June 2023 and is being held in the Mithaq Ward of Lakan Prison in Rasht.
In another repressive measure, criminal judge Sharifi-Nasab in the so-called revolutionary court in Tehran sentenced political prisoner Forough Taghipour to an additional year in prison on charges of publishing a message on the occasion of Student Day in 2025. Thirty-year-old Forough Taghipour, who holds a bachelor’s degree in accounting, was arrested in August 2023 and sentenced to 15 years in prison. She had previously been imprisoned from 2019 to 2022 for supporting the PMOI. Her uncle and two aunts, PMOI members Hojjatollah, Parvin, and Tayebeh Jabbarianha, were martyred in the 1980s. Her father and sister are currently in Ashraf 3.
Meanwhile, 40-year-old political prisoner Roozbeh Alipour, brother of martyred PMOI member Babak Alipour, who was arrested four months ago, remains in limbo in the solitary confinement cells of Ghezel Hesar Prison and is under severe physical and psychological pressure. He was violently arrested and beaten on January 26, 2026, in Tehran, and was subjected to interrogation and torture in Ward 209 of Evin Prison. After some time, he was transferred to Fashafouyeh (Greater Tehran) Prison. Last week, Roozbeh was transferred to Ward 35 (the secure ward) of Unit 3 in Ghezel Hesar.
Roozbeh, who suffered severe fractures to his hands and legs during his arrest and under torture, and who also sustained serious injuries to his head and face, was deprived of basic medical care in Evin and Fashafouyeh and suffers from compounded pressures in Ghezel Hesar. The prison authorities have deprived him of family visits and continuously beat him with pipes and sticks. Proud PMOI members Babak Alipour, Roozbeh’s brother, and Pouya Ghobadi were executed by hanging in Ghezel Hesar on March 31, 2026.
The Iranian Resistance calls on the relevant United Nations bodies and all international human rights authorities to strongly condemn the crimes of the mullahs’ regime in its prisons and to take immediate action for the release of political prisoners. It once again reiterates the necessity for an international fact-finding mission to visit Iranian prisons and meet with prisoners.
Secretariat of the National Council of Resistance of Iran (NCRI)
20 May 2026