Iranian regime aiming for ‘silent death’ of imprisoned Nobel Peace Prize winner thought to have cancer, family says

(CNN) — The family of imprisoned human rights activist Narges Mohammadi have accused the Iranian regime of trying to bring about her “slow death” by depriving her of a vital surgery needed to confirm her cancer diagnosis.

In an exclusive statement to CNN on Monday, the family accused Iranian authorities of “endangering her life” by depriving her access to the biopsy needed for a “clear diagnosis” of bone cancer.

It comes after her lawyer, Mostafa Nili, said on Sunday that doctors had recently detected a “bone lesion in her right leg suspected of being cancerous.”

For most of the past two decades, Mohammadi has been an inmate of Tehran’s Evin prison, which is notorious for housing critics of the Iranian regime. She was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 2023 for “her fight against the oppression of women in Iran and her fight to promote human rights and freedom for all.”

“The Islamic Republic government is risking Narges Mohammadi’s life, effectively aiming for a ‘silent death’ without bearing direct accountability,” the Narges Foundation, which is run by her family, said.

The family warned that any further delays in procuring treatment for Mohammadi may prove “fatal.” The activist had already had to wait nine weeks for the most recent hospital transfer which detected the potentially cancerous lesion.

Her family and lawyer are now calling for “immediate medical furlough” to both carry out the biopsy and treat a range of other health conditions she is grappling with. According to her lawyer, a recent MRI revealed the progression of arthritis and disc disease while doctors have also called for a further angiography on one of her heart arteries after she suffered a heart attack in 2021.

Years of successive imprisonment and bouts of extended periods of solitary confinement “have severely compromised (Mohammadi’s) health leaving her with conditions that cannot be addressed through a short, incomplete hospital visit,” her family stressed.

Iranian authorities told CNN, “unfortunately we don’t comment on human rights issues.”

High-profile figures such as former US Secretary of State Hilary Clinton have joined the call for Iranian authorities to release Mohammadi.

“By withholding medical care she needs, Iranian prison authorities are slowly killing detained activist and Nobel Peace Prize laureate Narges Mohammadi,” Clinton warned in a post on her official social media last Friday.

While in prison, Mohammadi has continued to campaign tirelessly for human rights causes, lobbying strongly for the rights of Iranian women and calling for a peaceful resolution to the war in Gaza.

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