Biden Administration Must Prioritize Human Rights and Free Expression in Responding to Iranian Election Outcome
As Iran elects a new president, PEN America urged the Biden Administration to emphasize the country’s dire human rights situation as it responds to the outcome of the vote. More
Nasrin Sotoudeh
Sotoudeh, a lawyer and women's rights activist was handed a 38-year sentence and 148 lashes for her work. In 2020, she went on a 46-day hunger strike to protest… More
Virtual Solidarity Reading to Honor Imprisoned Women Writers and Activists
On Thursday, May 27, PEN America—in partnership with Robert F. Kennedy Human Rights, Amnesty International USA, and the makers of the documentary film NASRIN—will host a virtual reading in… More
Letter: U.S. Must Prioritize Human Rights in Shaping Future Policy Toward Iran
In a joint letter to the Biden-Harris administration, PEN America and its allies call on the U.S. to prioritize human rights as it re-enters nuclear negotiations with Iran. More
Biden’s Iran Policy Must Include Focus on Human Rights, Groups Say in Joint Letter
Today PEN America and the Center for Human Rights in Iran, along with a coalition of human rights organizations, sent a joint letter to President Biden urging his administration… More
PEN America: China, Saudi Arabia, Turkey Remain World’s Top Jailers of Writers
In PEN America’s annual census of detained writers worldwide, The Freedom to Write Index, the literary and free expression group found that in 2020, at least 273 writers, academics,… More
Abolhassan Kamali
Poet Abolhassan Kamali was given a four month suspended sentence of 2 years 7 months in prison with an electronic handcuff on charges of blasphemy and spreading lies. He… More
Anisa Jafari-Mehr
Jafari-Mehr is a writer and literary critic at J, a Germany-based Kurdish-language magazine. She was arrested by Revolutionary Guard Intelligence Agents on November 23, 2020, alongside several other writers… More
Dariush Moradi
Kurdish cultural activist Moradi was arrested by security forces on November 23, 2020. Security forces searched his home and confiscated his belongings without a warrant. He was released from… More
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Gather with others on the journey to prison abolition to talk about how you can begin realizing a home, a country, and a world without prisons right where you are. Join @scalawagmag and PEN America TODAY for Realizing Abolition. https://scalawagmagazine.org/2021/06/realizing-abolition-event/
