Iranian authorities are deliberately depriving Sufi prisoner Saeid Soltanpour from the medical care he desperately needs 65 days into his debilitating hunger strike.
Sufi Prisoner Saeid Soltanpour has been deprived of adequate medical care and prison authorities told him that “He will not be treated until he is one step away from a stroke.”
Soltanpour has been suffering from severe pressure drop and decreased blood glucose.
Soltanpour, held at the Great Tehran Penitentiary, has launched his hunger strike since August 29th, protesting a vicious attack by the prison’s special guards units targeting section 3 where Sufi prisoners are held.
Dozens of the inmates were transferred to solitary confinement after guards using batons and tear gas broke up a sit-in protest they had held.
52 others were taken to section 1 for methadone-addictsand drug-addicted prisoners where sanitary conditions are very poor.
It said the prison management also cut off phone connections to wards where the Dervishes were being detained, to prevent information about them from leaking out.
A few days later an Iranian news outlet covering Iran’s Gonabadi Dervish minority said relatives of Dervishes wounded in the breakup of Wednesday’s protest were concerned that prison authorities would keep the inmates in solitary confinement until their wounds healed, in order to cover up the incident.
The Gonabadi Dervish inmates were calling for the release of female Dervishes held at Qarchak prison.
Saeid Soltanpour was among several hundred Dervishes arrested by security forces in February for involvement in anti-government protests in Tehran. He has been sentenced to seven years in prison, 74 lashes and exile for two years to Sistan and Baluchestan Province, after the completion of his sentence.
