Female Iranian activist dies from gunshot wounds sustained in 2022 protests

Sara Deldar, a former political prisoner, has died due to multiple infections caused by pellet wounds sustained during the 2022 nationwide protests after being shot by Iranian security forces.

After her arrest, Deldar was sentenced to more than one year in Rasht’s Lakan Prison, among thousands arrested in a mass roundup of opponents to the government. She was released on parole after serving more than six months, but her health was already deteriorating.

In her final Instagram post in July, Deldar described her severe ill health after her release citing infections, anemia, and the enlargement of her spleen, kidneys, and ovaries. The ailments were likely exacerbated by the bad treatment and conditions of her imprisonment where prisoners are often denied access to adequate healthcare.

Deldar also revealed that other prisoners released from Lakan Prison were suffering from similar illnesses.

Sara Deldar’s death is not an isolated incident. For over four decades, Iran’s prisons have become a graveyard for political prisoners and those who dare to defy the regime.

Among the many others suffering a similar fate is Mosayeb Yeganeh, who was returned to Tehran’s notorious Evin Prison from a hospital before his treatment was complete, and ultimately died due to his lack of medical care. Another Kurdish prisoner, Hasan Omarpour, was so desperate that he self-immolated at the same prison.

Many others have committed suicide either in detention or shortly after their release, often as a result of the brutal physical and psychological abuse they endure behind bars. In the last few months alone, several political prisoners have taken their own lives, unable to cope with the trauma inflicted by the state’s torturers.

Suspicious deaths have been reported in prisons across the country, including Lakan Prison, where Deldar was held, the Central Prison of Tabriz in East Azarbaijan Province, and Ilam Prison in Ilam Province.

The 2022 Woman, Life, Freedom protests, sparked by the killing of Mahsa Amini in the custody of the morality police, led to the deaths of over 500 protesters in the hands of Iran's security forces. Many more protesters died suspiciously in detention or shortly after their release, adding to an already mounting death toll.