Death toll, Iran Prison Fire, Tehran's Evin prison, Iran's judiciary authorities,
Death toll from Iran Prison Fire Now at 8: Judiciary
Translate This News In

In a fire that blazed amid disturbances within Tehran’s Evin prison, eight convicts died, double the number of deaths originally reported, according to Iran’s judiciary authorities on Monday.
After four weeks of demonstrations over the murder of 22-year-old Masha Amini following her imprisonment for allegedly breaking Iran’s severe dress code for women, the fire on Saturday night, which Iran said broke out during “riots and fights,” followed her death. The wave of protests has grown into a significant anti-government movement in the Islamic republic, posing one of the strongest threats to its clerical leadership since the overthrow of the shah in 1979.

READ:   Pakistan's polio-free dream has proved unknown after spending $5 billion over 27 years

“The overall number of casualties of the fire and the conflict amongst convicts has reached eight,” the judiciary’s Mizan Online website said after four Evin prison inmates injured in the fire passed away in the hospital.

Video footage released on social media sites shows the facility being lighted by flames and suffocated by smoke while gunshots and explosions can be heard throughout the fire.

The institution was allegedly subjected to deployment of tear gas, according to the families of prisoners and rights organisations.

Foreign detainees as well as thousands of others facing criminal accusations are held in Evin, a jail notorious for the mistreatment of political prisoners.

READ:   Biden says that the US will meet its target of 100 million viruses on Friday

They include hundreds of people who were detained during the most recent protests and as part of a campaign against civil society.