International Outcry After Reported Arrest of Narges Mohammadi

Narges Mohammadi, the 2023 Nobel Peace Prize laureate, was reportedly detained by plain clothed security forces on Friday, December 12, 2025, while attending a memorial in the northeastern city of Mashhad for the human rights lawyer Khosrow Alikordi. Multiple rights organisations, witnesses and Mohammadi’s French lawyer, Chirine Ardakani, said she was seized after speaking at the service and denouncing Alikordi’s death, which rights groups have called suspicious.

Accounts published on December 13 by Reuters and statements from Front Line Defenders and the Narges Foundation described the detention as violent. Taghi Rahmani, Mohammadi’s husband, told BBC Persian that the arrest was forceful and said a brother of the deceased lawyer had witnessed the scene. Front Line Defenders characterised the operation as an "outrageous assault" and, together with the Free Narges Coalition, called for Mohammadi’s immediate release.

Front Line Defenders reported that other human rights defenders and participants at the memorial were detained alongside Mohammadi. Named individuals taken into custody include Alieh Motalebzadeh, Sepideh Gholian, Hasti Amiri and Pouran Nazemi, in addition to unspecified other participants. Media accounts say some attendees chanted slogans including "death to the dictator" and "long live Iran," though witness reports vary on the tone and scope of the demonstration.

Khosrow Alikordi, a well known lawyer who had defended human rights cases, was found dead in his office earlier in the week. Norway based Iran Human Rights and other organisations have called for an independent inquiry into how he died. Rights groups and relatives have demanded transparency and an impartial investigation, a demand that organisers at the memorial amplified and that appears to have precipitated the detentions.

Mohammadi has been a central figure in Iran’s women’s rights movement and has served multiple prison sentences on national security charges. She is serving a combined sentence of 13 years and nine months, according to reporting by IranIntl and others. She had been on medical furlough from Tehran’s Evin Prison and was reported by some outlets to have had her sentence conditionally suspended or temporarily released roughly a year earlier. In December 2024 she was temporarily released on medical grounds for three weeks. Mohammadi previously said she would not return to prison voluntarily and framed any re arrest as a form of civil disobedience.

The Norwegian Nobel Committee publicly called on Iranian authorities to immediately clarify Mohammadi’s whereabouts, joining an array of international human rights organisations that warned the reported arrests reflect an intensifying clamp down on freedom of assembly, press freedom and the work of human rights defenders. Rights groups and diaspora media have linked a reported escalation in repression to a range of regional and domestic developments, including post conflict dynamics and shifts after a June ceasefire with Israel.

Iranian authorities had not publicly confirmed the detention or provided a location for Mohammadi at the time of reporting. The lack of official information has intensified calls for independent oversight into both Alikordi’s death and the treatment of those detained at the memorial. International legal advocates say prompt clarification and unfettered access for independent investigators are essential to prevent further erosion of civic space and to meet Iran’s obligations under international human rights law.