Hundreds of Children Separated From Their Imprisoned Mothers
Published by Ali on January 28, 2019
At least 1,800 children of imprisoned women, were separated from their mothers and were delivered to Welfare Organization, the state-run ILNA news agency reported on 26 January.
According to ILNA, Mohammad Nefriyeh, director general of the Children and Youth affairs in the Welfare Organization, said: “According to a memorandum between the Welfare Organization and the Prison Organisations, all children above two years of age who live with their mothers in prison, must be delivered to the Welfare Organization.”
A member of parliament had earlier said that over 2,300 children live in prison in Iran with their mothers.
Mohammad Javad Fathi, member of the judicial committee of the Iranian parliament, announced that 2300 kids are in prisons along with their parents, a situation which is “very strange” and “needs to be deliberated on.”
Fathi urged the Prisons Organization to provide a “transparent statistics on the number of imprisoned mothers,” adding, “Concealing the figures do not solve any problems, although the high numbers could be really regrettable.”
It becomes clear that 2300 is not the final number and should be considered as minimum.
The presence of so many small children in prisons in Iran is tragic while international laws oblige all governments to refrain from issuing prison sentences for women who have to take care of children and their prison sentences must be replaced by alternative punishments including “suspension of detention.”
IRANNTV has had several reports and programs about imprisoned mothers, “street children”, and their horrible life conditions in Iran.
