MADRID, 16 Oct. (EUROPA PRESS) –
At least four people have died and 61 have been injured in the fire declared in the Evin prison, in the north of Tehran, the capital of Iran, according to the balance published by the Media Center of the Iranian Judiciary.
According to this source, quoted by the semi-official Iranian news agency Tasnim, the four deceased were convicted of robbery. In recent hours, news has proliferated about a possible mutiny by those imprisoned for participating in the recent protests.
Most of the inmates who have received health care have suffered from smoke inhalation poisoning.
The Iranian public television in Arabic Al Alam has confirmed that there was a riot inside the prison and clashes between the prisoners themselves in the wings dedicated to “thugs” and robbery prisoners that led to the fire in the bedding warehouse.
Up to 70 prisoners have been rescued. Of the 61 treated, up to 51 have already been discharged and the rest remain hospitalized.
According to the governor of Tehran province, Mohsen Mansuri, quoted by Tasnim, “firefighters and security forces have the Evin prison fire under control and the situation is calm.”
Mansuri has specified that the fire started in wings 7 and 8 on Saturday afternoon and has pointed out that the violence was concentrated in a detention area for “thugs and gangsters.”
The videos of the spectacular fire have been broadcast on social networks while media such as Radio Farda, a station in Farsi financed by the United States, reported that the security forces have used tear gas to disperse the families of the prisoners concentrated after learning of the fire .
According to Radio Farda, the fire began in wing 7, where initially the prisoners were held during the wave of protests in 2008. However, later the majority were prisoners for financial crimes and later the “thugs”. Now there would also be political prisoners in wings 7 and 8 of the prison and that would be where a riot and then the fire would have originated, always according to Radio Farda.
