TEHRAN: Human rights activists in Iran have raised concerns about mass arrests during the country’s largest protests in nearly a decade after at least three demonstrators died in a notorious Tehran jail. Separately, Nasrin Sotoudeh, a prominent human rights lawyer, told the Guardian on the phone from Tehran that at least two other protesters had died in the jail. He is a member of the Gonabadi dervish order, a minority Muslim sect not recognised by the Iranian authorities. Concern about the fate of thousands of detainees had been heightened by Ghanbari’s death, Hadi Ghaemi, the executive director of the Centre for Human Rights in Iran, said. “We’re also concerned that the Iranian authorities are denying the family members of that arrested information about the fate and whereabouts of their loved ones.

Source: Pakistan Today January 09, 2018 11:15 UTC