Iran has moved its female prisoners into a ‘hellhole’ detention centre following an Israeli airstrike on the country’s most infamous jail. 

Israel targeted Evin, a prison in Tehran where political detainees are held, the day before a ceasefire agreement ended a 12-day conflict.

Prisoners from Evin have been transferred to Qarchak prison, as mentioned by The Telegraph. Qarchak is a former livestock facility that has been converted into a detention center located approximately 40 miles south of Tehran.

Activist groups have frequently raised concerns over Qarchak, which is known for carrying out torture and other human rights violations. 

There is also no proper sewage system or access to clean water, it is reported.  

Many women arrested during the 2022 Mahsa Amini protests were locked up in Qarchak, and several are still being held there. 

One woman described being moved from Evin to Qarchak following the Israeli strike in an audio recording. 

A female inmate expressed that despite surviving the bombings by the United States and Israel, the conditions in the Islamic Republic have become so dire in the new prison that it feels like a form of slow death for the detainees.

Iran has moved its female prisoners into a ‘hellhole’ detention centre following an Israeli airstrike on the country’s infamous Evin jail

Qarchak prison is a former livestock facility-turned detention camp around 40 miles south of Tehran

Pictured: Evin prison, Iran’s,most notorious jails for political prisoners 

‘They’ve brought us to a place where humans don’t live. It’s a gradual death.’

The woman also called the detention centre a ‘real hellhole’ and described being crammed into a small quarantine ward with other inmates where ‘the stench of filth’ is everywhere and the food inedible. 

Between 1,500 and 2,000 women are held at Qarchak throughout most of the year. Each hall was designed for fewer than 100 people, but they typically home over 150.

The prison is also infested with cockroaches, rats, water bugs and lizards, and medical care is very limited. 

Despite the lack of adequate healthcare, prisoners are often given tranquilisers. 

Most inmates at Qarchak are women from marginalised and vulnerable backgrounds, and also holds children up to the age of four with their mothers.  

Male inmates are understood to have been taken from Evin to Fashafoyeh prison outside the capital following the Israeli strike.

Between 1,500 and 2,000 women are held at Qarchak throughout most of the year

The prison is also infested with cockroaches, rats, water bugs and lizards, and medical care is very limited

Female prisoners in notorious Iranian prison, Evi

The inmates at Evin are cramped into three-high bunk beds in four cells of up to 20 people, where they are reportedly left ‘freezing’ in the winter and sweltering in the summer

Iranian women inmates sit at their cell in the infamous Evin jail, north of Tehran

The transfer of the inmates to the infamous prison comes as Iranian authorities have launched a wave of arrests following the fragile ceasefire, detaining hundreds on espionage charges, as the weakened government becomes increasingly paranoid. 

The conditions in Evin prison were also dreadful. 

The detention centre was known for holding political prisoners of the Islamic Republic, including foreign nationals, such as British citizen Nazanin Zaghari-Ratclife, who was freed in 2022. 

Women locked up in Evin prison were ‘interrogated for 10 to 12 hours every day’ and threatened with beatings and even executions, multiple sources once told the BBC. 

Ms Zaghari-Ratcliffe said about her time at Evin: ‘I spent nine months in solitary confinement with very little access to anything. Being claustrophobic, solitary was a horrific experience.’