“I wake up bracing for the worst call”: Brother fears jailed Nobel laureate Narges Mohammadi is running out of time
Every morning, Hamidreza Mohammadi reaches for his phone with dread.
He lives in Norway now, far from Iran. Far from his sister. But the fear is constant. “I wake up waiting for the worst call I could get,” he said quietly, his voice carrying the weight of someone preparing for unimaginable news.
Narges Mohammadi — Nobel Peace Prize winner, activist, mother — is 54 and gravely ill. On Friday, she was rushed from Zanjan Prison to a local hospital after what her family describes as a catastrophic collapse in her health. Another heart attack. Blood pressure crashing. Doctors struggling.
And maybe too late.
She has long battled serious medical conditions: heart disease, pulmonary embolisms, lung complications, high blood pressure. Last month, inmates reportedly found her unconscious on the prison floor after a suspected cardiac episode. For 140 days, her brother says, officials ignored repeated pleas to transfer her to a proper medical facility.
Now, the hospital in Zanjan reportedly lacks the expertise to treat her complex condition — especially after previous stenting and angiography. Her family is pleading for her to be moved to Tehran, where specialists familiar with her case could step in. Where she might actually stand a chance.
The Nobel Committee agrees. Its chair has warned that her life is in danger.
Hamidreza doesn’t mince words. He believes the delays are deliberate. That authorities are simply waiting her out. “I have no doubt,” he said, “that they have decided to get rid of people like Narges.”
Iranian officials have not publicly responded.
Meanwhile, global attention drifts elsewhere — to oil routes, to the Strait of Hormuz, to rising regional tensions. “It seems oil is more important than freedom now,” her brother said. It wasn’t just anger. It was exhaustion.
Mohammadi has been arrested 13 times. Sentenced to 31 years in total, plus 154 lashes. She was briefly released late last year for medical reasons, only to be re-arrested weeks later after giving a speech honoring another activist. Her family says she was beaten during that arrest. She was hospitalized. Then sentenced again.
Seven and a half more years.
Moved without warning. Cut off from loved ones.
Now she lies in a provincial hospital her family says cannot save her. And her brother waits by the phone. Every day.
