Accusation of Mahsa Amini’s family lawyer of “propaganda against the Iranian regime”

Iranian authorities accused, Tuesday, Saleh Nikbakht, the lawyer of the family of Mahsa Amini, who previously represented a number of political and civil activists, of “propaganda against the regime” after he was summoned to the second branch of the Revolutionary Prosecution, located in Evin Prison, north of Tehran.

Nikbakht was summoned to the second branch of the “Prosecutor General’s Investigation and Holy Revolution” at Tehran’s Evin Prison and charged with “propaganda against the regime,” according to the Kurdistan Human Rights Network.

The lawyer was provisionally released “on bail” until the court hearing, she said.

An informed source told the Kurdistan Human Rights Network that Nikbakht had been prosecuted and charged with this crime because of “interviews with foreign media.”

According to the same source, Nikbakht’s charges include being interviewed and talking about the case of his former and current clients.

The summons comes exactly six months after Mahsa Amini’s family lawyer was killed while in custody by a moral police patrol in Tehran in mid-September 2022.

Mahsa Amini, a young woman from Saqqez in Kurdistan in Iran who came to Tehran with her family to visit relatives, was arrested by a morality and ethics police patrol and died later on September 16th.

The death of Mahsa Amini turned into widespread protests against the Iranian government across the country.

Iran’s Forensic Medicine Organization said Amini’s death was not due to police beating, but due to a previous patient who was born.

The months-long protests resulted in the deaths of 529 people, thousands of Iranians were arrested, and judicial authorities announced the execution of four protesters.