Critically ill Iranian Nobel laureate transferred to hospital

Iranian Nobel Peace Prize laureate Narges Mohammadi has been transferred to Tehran Pars Hospital more than a week after collapsing in prison, with authorities granting her a suspended sentence on heavy bail, her family-run foundation announced Sunday. The 54-year-old activist, who won the 2023 Nobel Peace Prize while already imprisoned for her campaigns advocating women's rights and the abolition of capital punishment, suffered a heart attack approximately two weeks prior and had lost consciousness twice before being moved from Zanjan prison, located northwest of the capital. The transfer followed days of urgent appeals from her family and supporters who described her condition as critical. Forensic medicine doctors appointed by the Iranian government determined that due to her multiple serious health conditions, she requires continued treatment outside prison under supervision of her own medical team, according to her lawyer Mostafa Nili. Mohammadi had been imprisoned since December following her denouncement of the death of lawyer Khosrow Alikordi, and received a new 7.5-year sentence in February. Her family says her health deteriorated in part because she was brutally beaten during detention, and she requires constant monitoring for a blood clot in her lung that predates her arrest, necessitating anticoagulants. Despite the temporary suspension, her foundation insists it is insufficient and called for her unconditional freedom with dismissal of all charges. The family estimates 18 years remain on her sentence. Her brother Hamidreza, speaking from Oslo, expressed relief at the transfer news. The Nobel Committee had previously called on Tehran to release her immediately, and rights organizations have documented ongoing executions of people involved in the mass protests that swept Iran beginning in September 2022, which authorities suppressed by shutting down most internet access in the country in January.