Iranian authorities arrested Nobel Peace Prize laureate Narges Mohammadi on Friday, her foundation said, citing her brother.
The Paris-based foundation said Mohammadi was “violently detained” by security and police forces during a memorial ceremony for Khosrow Alikordi, a lawyer recently found dead in his office. It cited “verified reports” and her brother, Mehdi. She was arrested in Mashhad, Iran’s second-largest city.
One of Iran’s most prominent human rights activists, Mohammadi won the Nobel Peace Prize in 2023.
In a statement Friday, the Norwegian Nobel Committee denounced the “brutal arrest” of Mohammadi and other activists and called for her immediate release.
“The Norwegian Nobel Committee calls on the Iranian authorities to immediately clarify Mohammadi’s whereabouts, ensure her safety and integrity, and to release her without conditions,” the five-member body said in the statement issued by its chairman. “The Committee stands in solidarity with Narges Mohammadi and all those in Iran who work peacefully for human rights, the rule of law, and freedom of expression.”
Mohammadi has spent most of the past two decades as an inmate of Tehran’s Evin prison — notorious for detaining critics of the regime.
In December 2024, Iranian authorities suspended her prison term for three weeks to allow her to recover from a surgery she had in November to remove part of a bone in her lower right leg, where doctors had discovered a lesion suspected of being cancerous.
