Despite a recent government amnesty announcement, Iranian journalist and political activist Kasra Nouri, 32, remains imprisoned. His lawyer, Farshid Yadollahi, told the Shargh Daily paper that Nouri was granted amnesty in one legal case, while his new case is still with the Shiraz Prosecutor’s Office. In August 2022, Nouri was charged with “assembly and collusion against national security” for an unpublished statement, which he wrote with other activists such as Leila Hossein Zadeh, and it is this case that is still pending and preventing his release.

Authorities arrested Nouri in February 2018 when dozens of Dervish community members gathered on Golestan-e Haftom street in the Pasdaran neighborhood in north Tehran to protect the residence of their spiritual leader, Noor Ali Tabandeh, whom they feared intelligence agencies planned to arrest. On February 19 and 20, 2018, authorities reportedly attacked the protestors, severely injuring dozens. Law enforcement agents also died in the clashes, including three who were struck by a bus.

In July 2018, branch 26 of Tehran’s revolutionary court sentenced Nouri to 12 years in prison, 74 lashes, two years in exile, two years of deprived social rights, and a two-year travel ban on the charges of “assembly and collusion against national security,” “disrupting public order,” “rebelling against officers on duty,” and “propaganda against the state.” Under article 134 of Iran’s criminal procedure law, Nouri had to serve seven years and six months. He has been held in Adel Abad Prison in Shiraz, which is hundreds of kilometers away from his family’s hometown in Tehran.

Authorities previously arrested and imprisoned Nouri several times, as well as detaining other family members, including his mother Shokoufeh Yadollahi and his brothers Amir Nouri and Pooria Nouri. According to BBC, Shokoufeh Yadollahi, Amir Nouri, and Pooria Nouri were physically and psychologically tortured. Following the 2018 Golestan-e Haftom street incident, revolutionary courts sentenced at least 208 members of the Dervish religious minority to prison terms and other punishments in unfair trials that violated their basic rights.

Nouri is a student at the University of Tehran and was the CEO of “majzooban-e-noor” website, which covers news about the Dervish religious community.