According to documents obtained by the Hana Organization for Human Rights, Ali Asghar Chalabiani, a Kurmanj Kurdish poet and writer from the village of Peshaneh, in Raz & Jargalan County, has once again been summoned to the Bojnourd General and Revolutionary Prosecutor’s Office.
According to a notice issued on Tuesday, August 18, 2026, by Branch One of the Deputy Prosecutor’s Office of the Bojnourd General and Revolutionary Prosecutor’s Office, this writer is required to appear before that branch within five days to answer the charge of “publishing computer related falsehoods.”
This summons comes a few weeks after Chalabiani announced that, in a separate case, following a complaint filed by a judicial officer, he had been sentenced to 55 lashes and a fine of approximately 61 million tomans. However, no copy of the verdict in this conviction has been made public, and the specific charge, the issuing branch, and whether the sentence has become final all remain unclear.
A review of earlier documents shows that he had been summoned on February 1, 2024, on the charge of “propaganda against the system.” Likewise, in an indictment dated March 12, 2024, content posted on his personal account was made the basis of a charge of “insulting Islamic sanctities.” Branch 105 of Bojnourd Criminal Court Two, moreover, in a verdict dated June 7, 2024, invoking Article 513 of the Islamic Penal Code, sentenced him to one year’s imprisonment. A further case, on charges of “propaganda against the system” and “insulting the Leader of the Islamic Republic,” had also been filed against him in the Bojnourd Revolutionary Court. Chalabiani ultimately spent 10 months in Bojnourd Central Prison.
It is worth noting that, during his imprisonment, he went on a hunger strike for 12 days and subsequently developed kidney problems. The issuance, and possible carrying out, of the flogging sentence under these circumstances could place his health at serious risk.