Saman Nasim, a political prisoner detained in Urmia prison, was released on bail after seven years of detention.
According to the Campaign for the Defense of Political and Civil Prisoners, on October 16th, 2018, Saman Nasim, a political prisoner detained in the Urmia Prison, was temporarily released on 500,000 Tomans bail until the trial is held.
Saman Nasim, a political prisoner from Marivan was arrested in July 2011. Despite the fact that his death sentence was reduced by Branch 12 of the West Azerbaijan Appeal to 5 years imprisonment, after serving more than six years of imprisonment, with the request of the parents of one of the members of the Revolutionary Guards, who was killed in the July 1990 clash, he has been facing a new case since mid-August of 2018.
Saman Nasim, born in 1993, was arrested by the Revolutionary Guards at the Sardasht border on charges of membership in the Kurdistan Free Life Party (PJAK), on July 18th, 2011. The first branch of the Revolutionary Court of Mahabad accused him of being a member of the PJAK group and armed activity against the Revolutionary Guards, “Mohareb”, and sentenced him to death.
On Wednesday, Feb. 18th, 2015, Saman Nasim and Younes Aghayan, along with four other political prisoners sentenced to death, were transferred to the Urmia Central Prison, and then Younes Aghayan were transferred to Zanjan Prison.
On September 7th, 2016. Saman Nasim court session was held at Branch 12 of Urmia Criminal Court with the presence of the lawyer of this political prisoner. It is said that the judge in the case has agreed to hold another court session for the final defense. In February 2016, his verdict was reduced to 5 years imprisonment in the West Azerbaijan province’s appeals court.
Saman Nasim was under the age of 18 when the alleged crime was committed and the death penalty for him was a violation of international human rights law, including the Convention on the Rights of the Child, which Iran committed to respect. His death sentence was almost carried out in February 2015, and he was transferred to an unknown location for execution of the sentence. The Iranian judicial authorities then refused to give his families any information about the fate of Saman Nasim or his whereabouts for five months. Amnesty International, with the launch of a campaign, while expressing concern about the lack of clarity of the status of Saman Nasim, urged human rights activists around the world to join the campaign in order to save Saman Nasim life and clarify his fate and state of affairs.
After almost five months of total ignorance, Saman Nasim was finally allowed to contact his family and inform them of his location that was Zanjan prison. At the same time, it became clear that the head of the judiciary, under international pressure, ordered the death penalty to be stopped. Saman Nasim’s case was then sent to a retrial court in West Azerbaijan province.
Amnesty International went on to work on several immediate actions and ongoing follow-up to stop the issuance of the death penalty for Saman Nasim again. In 2015, Saman Nasim’s case was one of the 12 cases of the annual Amnesty International Campaign, entitled “Write for the Right”. Hundreds of thousands of countries from around the world, including European countries, as well as Togo, Burkina Faso, Nauru, Mongolia, Paraguay, Hong Kong, New Zealand, Tunisia, Venezuela, Moldova and Nepal, participated in this global campaign and sent a letter to judicial authorities calling for a fair trial for Saman Nasim and not issuing a death sentenced again.