Mohsen Omrani
Age:
Activities/Rights: Teachers’ Union
Status: Released on bail
Judicial status: Awaiting sentencing
Violations: Arbitrary arrest and detention, lack of due process, unfair trial, access to lawyer, denial of medical care
Mohsen Omrani is a teacher and member of the Bushehr Teachers’ Union who was first arrested in 2015. In 2016, he was sentenced to five years and eight months imprisonment, 40 lashes and a fine, which was reduced to a year on charges of “propaganda against the system” on appeal. He began serving his sentence in May 2017 but suffered from various medical illnesses in prison where he was denied adequate medical care. He was released from prison on 19 March 2018. Mohsen was summoned for interrogations about his trade union work as part of a new fabricated case against him on 26 May 2021 and his case referred to Branch Four of the Bushehr Investigator’s Office. He was arrested at the International Labour Day gathering in Bushehr on 1 May 2022 and released on bail on 21 May. He was re-arrested at a teachers’ protest on 15 July 2022 and released on bail six days later.
On 23 January 2023, the Board of Education ruled to cut his salary by a third and deprive him of other benefits for six months for taking part in the teachers’ protest. On February 5, he was indicted of “assembly and collusion against national security, disrupting public peace and order, and disobeying an officer on duty.” He was released on bail on 3 May 2023. There are currently three open cases against Mohsen, with the trial for the aforementioned charges taking place on 22 May. On 14 November, he was tried for charges of “propaganda activities against the system” by the Bushehr Revolutionary Court.