Iran: Hunger Strike by Political Prisoner Mir-Yousef Younesi in Protest Against Transfer to Ward for Common Criminals
Younesi is a 70-year-old political prisoner who has spent a total of 14 years in prison since the Shah’s era for supporting the PMOI
On Tuesday, May 13, 2025, Mir-Yousef Younesi, a 70-year-old political prisoner, went on hunger strike to protest his transfer to Ward 7, which houses inmates convicted of common criminal offenses.
A week earlier, on Tuesday, May 6, 2025, he was forcibly and violently transferred to Ward 7 while returning from a visitation with his son, Ali Younesi—a detained elite student. The repressive security forces first separated the father and son, stating that they could not remain in the same ward and must be held in separate sections.
That same day, political prisoners in Evin’s Ward 4 staged a sit-in in front of the guard officer’s office and the criminal head of the ward, Ghasemi, to protest the sudden and forced transfer. They demanded the return of Mir-Yousef to Ward 4. Subsequently, prison authorities promised the protesters that he would be brought back. However, a week has passed, and he remains in the ward designated for common criminals.
Mir-Yousef is a political prisoner from the time of the monarchy’s dictatorship as well as from the 1980s under the clerical regime. He has spent a total of 14 years in prison solely for supporting the People’s Mojahedin Organization of Iran (PMOI/MEK). Since December 2022, he has been held in the notorious Evin Prison, where he suffers from diabetes and hearing loss. He has been denied access to a doctor, medication, and medical care.
Ali Younesi, a 25-year-old computer engineering student at Sharif University of Technology, was arrested in Tehran in May 2020, and along with another elite student, Amirhossein Moradi, was sentenced to 16 years in prison.
The Iranian Resistance calls on the UN Human Rights Council, the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, the UN Special Rapporteur on the situation of human rights in Iran, and all international human rights bodies to condemn the regime’s brutal treatment of political prisoners and to take urgent action for the release of ailing detainees.
Secretariat of the National Council of Resistance of Iran (NCRI)
14 May 2025