Ayatollah Sadegh Larijani, the head of Iran’s Judiciary, says that no violations occurred during an incident in Ward 350 of Evin Prison and he slammed “seditious efforts at creating adverse publicity.”

ISNA reports that on Wednesday April 23 at a meeting of top judiciary officials, Ayatollah Larijani referred to the recent incident in Ward 350 of Evin Prison, saying: “Carrying out inspections in Evin Prison are one of the legal and procedural duties of the Prison Organization, and according to the report filed by the respected head of the organization, no violations have occurred.”

Last Thursday, the Kaleme opposition website reported an attack on political prisoners in Ward 350 of Evin. The report indicates that during an unprecedentedly long and aggressive inspection, the prisoners protested by chanting, and in response, officials from the intelligence ministry and the Revolutionary Guards intelligence office joined with 100 soldiers on prison guard duty to swarm the ward and severely beat and injure more than 30 prisoners.

Larijani said: “It appears that seditious elements have used this completely legal procedure [prisoner inspection] to come into the arena and revive their seditious ambitions by orchestrating people inside with enemies outside the country.”

He warned that prosecutors are directed to investigate any potential charges of “publication of falsehoods and disruption of national security” regarding this matter.

The families of prisoners in Ward 350 staged protests in recent days in front of Parliament and the President’s Office to demand an investigation into the alleged incident at Evin Prison.

Radio Zamaneh