Activist inside prison calls for the boycott of the elections

International Liberty Association: Political prisoner Maryam Akbari Monfared sent a letter from Semnan Prison calling for the boycott of the Iranian regime’s sham presidential election. Maryam Akbari Monfared has been in jail for 12 years without a single day so furlough. The political prisoner said that her voice from behind bars echoes Iranian mothers who have been suffering since the 1980s for their loved ones. 

Following is the translation of the text of her letter from Semnan Prison: 

I boycott the election farce, This is my voice from behind bars in the Prison of Semnan under the most horrible conditions. My voice echoes the 33-year voice of mothers seeking justice for victims of the 1988 (massacre) and the November 2019 slaughter.

What happened in the summer of 1988 did not end there. It was the beginning of the slaughter (of our people). Its continuation, coupled with silence and inaction, led to the (slaughter in) November 2019 and spilled more blood. 

Today, the roaring of those sacrifices, echoing the cries of the mothers of victims of the 1988 massacre. These mothers wailed in their loneliness. Instead of the graves of their loved ones, they put their children’s photos on a pile of soil and cried. The images have kept their loved ones young and lively forever. Now, the same cries from the mothers of (victims of the slaughters in) 2017 and 2019 are splitting the ears of oppressors.

From behind the prison’s barbed wires and tall walls, I cry out in unison with the people of Iran. 

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