Daijiworld Media Network – Tehran

Tehran, Dec 12: Iranian Nobel Peace Prize laureate Narges Mohammadi was “violently” arrested on Friday while attending a memorial ceremony in Mashhad, her supporters said, marking yet another crackdown on one of the country’s most prominent human rights defenders.

Mohammadi, who had been on temporary leave from prison since December 2024, was detained along with several activists during the ceremony held for 45-year-old lawyer Khosrow Alikordi. Alikordi, who represented clients in sensitive political cases and defended those detained during the 2022 nationwide protests, was found dead in his office on December 5. Rights groups have demanded an independent probe into what Iran Human Rights described as “very serious suspicion of a state murder.”

Mohammadi’s Paris-based husband, Taghi Rahmani, confirmed on X that she was arrested alongside fellow activist Sepideh Gholian. Videos shared by HRANA showed Mohammadi—without the mandatory headscarf—standing among a crowd of supporters, chanting slogans such as “Long live Iran,” “We fight, we die, we accept no humiliation,” and “Death to the dictator.”

Other footage aired by Persian-language channels showed the 53-year-old climbing atop a vehicle with a microphone and urging the crowd to continue their chants.

Mohammadi, arrested multiple times since 2021, has spent much of the past decade behind bars. Her twin children accepted the 2023 Nobel Peace Prize on her behalf in Oslo, as she has been barred from leaving Iran and has not seen them for 11 years. Even outside prison, she has remained openly defiant—refusing to wear the headscarf, addressing global audiences through virtual events, and meeting activists across the country.

A fearless critic of Iran’s clerical establishment since the 1979 revolution, Mohammadi has repeatedly predicted the system’s eventual fall. Her re-arrest comes amid renewed scrutiny of Iran’s human rights record following Alikordi’s mysterious death.