Mahnaz Parakand
Lawyer
Member of the Defenders of Human Rights Center Mahnaz Parakand discussed necessary steps for implementing human rights protections in an interview with the International Campaign for Human Rights in Iran. “Before thinking to design a Citizenship Rights Charter, we must implement the Iranian Constitution, even with all its shortcomings. Many of the articles of the Constitution that are related to the people’s rights have been dormant for years,” she said.
Mahnaz Parakand represented imprisoned human rights lawyers Abdolfattah Solani and Nasrin Sotoudeh, as well as seven Baha’i faith followers. She left Iran in 2011, following intimidation and harassment by security forces, and she currently resides in Germany. In the years following the 1979 Iranian Revolution, Parakand was a political activist. She was arrested at a demonstration in June 1981, and spent five years inside Evin and Ghezel Hessar Prisons. She was released in 1986 and was eventually able to return to law school and complete her education. She was an apprentice at Abdolfattah Soltani’s law firm, and went on to represent him as one of his lawyers.
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