Who are Sotoudeh’s clients? They are the Baha’i, who are denied all legal rights in Iran due to their faith. They are minors facing execution after the police tortured murder confessions out of them. They are the desperate mothers of children that are being sexually abused by their fathers, whom have all custody rights under Iran’s Islamist law. Increasingly, they are also women, like Sotoudeh herself, who have defied Iran’s headscarf laws. In her case, Sotoudeh did so while serving time in political wing of Evin Prison, where she refused to wear the institutional chador.
Sotoudeh never did it alone. She was always part of a network of human rights activists (we hesitate to use the term “human rights,” since the regime has done its best to demonize it as a Western, anti-Islamic construct). Yet, she is always the first to credit her husband Reza Khandan for his support and commitment to a freer society. Her supporters also include the great, state-blacklisted filmmaker Jafar Panahi (who probably understands what she has endured better than anyone). He even gave her a part in his charming guerilla film, Taxi.
So, do you want the good news or the bad news first? Recently, well after Kaufman locked Nasrin, Sotoudeh was provisionally released from prison. Unfortunately, she subsequently tested positive for Covid, which isn’t surprising. The Iranian government was warned their prison were a perfect incubator for Covid, but they obviously did not care. Regardless, Sotoudeh is still hardly free now. As she herself says in a speech following her first release, she went from “the small prison to the big prison.”
