The appeal court confirmed the sentence of 10 years in prison and 2 years barred from work and leaving the country for Aras Amiri without the presence of Amiri or her attorney.

Amiri, a cultural activist and a student at Kingston University in Britain has been in prison since September 2018.

She was sentenced to ten years in prison and two years barred from social activities by Judge Salavati in April of 2019.

In her letter from prison to the chief of the judiciary, Ebrahim Raeesi, Ms. Amiri stressed that her charges are baseless and the only reason for her arrest and prison sentence was “rejecting the offer to cooperate with agents of Intelligence Ministry.”

In her letter, Amiri states that despite putting up bail for her release, the Intelligence Ministry agents did not release her and claimed that “setting bail was a mistake.”

She goes on to say that she was kept in solitary confinement in Ward 209 of Evin Prison for the first 69 days, where she was interrogated mornings and evenings with a small break. She was later charged with “membership in an illegal group”.

According to Amiri, she was released after the initial 69 days on a bail of 500 million tomans. She was contacted by the Intelligence agents a few times and she says “in the third meeting, I directly rejected their offer for cooperation and told them that I can only work in my own field and nothing else.”

Soon after, she was summoned to court again and was arrested on the charge of “forming and managing an anti-regime network,” and was told since there is a chance that she might escape the country, she will be taken to Evin Prison again.

She also mentions that her first attorney was rejected by Judge Salavati and she was forced to hire a new attorney.