Nobel Laureate Narges Mohammadi Recounts Abuse Inside Iranian Prisons In Secret Memoir

2 min readUpdated: May 11, 2026 01:52 PM IST

Written by Samiksha Choudhary

Iranian Nobel Peace Prize laureate Narges Mohammadi has detailed years of beatings, solitary confinement and alleged medical neglect in Iranian prisons in a memoir smuggled out of jail, according to a report by The Guardian.

The memoir, ‘A Woman Never Stops Fighting’ recounts her experiences inside Iran’s Evin, Qarchak and Zanjan prisons, where she says, authorities repeatedly denied her medical treatment despite severe health complications, including pulmonary embolism, seizures and heart problems.

Mohammadi, who was recently awarded the Nobel Peace Prize for her work in promoting women’s rights and abolishing the death penalty in Iran, has been arrested several times by the authorities. Iranian judicial system has imposed on her multiple long-term imprisonments as well as lashes for the charges related to her activism.

Mohammadi even compared solitary confinement to “white torture” in her excerpts published by The Guardian. By stating that the Iranian prisons use isolation, intimidation, and denial of medical care to break prisoners mentally, she indirectly disclosed the psychological torture inflicted through these methods. Besides that, she mentioned that the physical and mental health of detainees is seriously undermined by repeated interrogations in combination with solitary confinement.

The report comes amid growing international concern over Mohammadi’s health. Reports says this week that the activist was transferred from prison to a Tehran hospital after suffering serious cardiac complications. Her family and supporters have warned that her condition remains critical and have demanded her unconditional release.

Mohammadi has marked herself as one of the leading voices for the women-led protests that blew up after the death of Mahsa Amini in police custody in 2022. The “Women Life Freedom” protests in Iran were the trigger for these demonstrations. By continuing her work of highlighting the plight of female prisoners and exposing the use of solitary confinement in Iran, she has even risked her own life as a prisoner to do so.

(Samiksha Choudhary is an intern with The Indian Express)

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