Narges Mohammadi has become synonymous with the fight for human rights in Iran – a battle that has cost this activist almost everything.
On Sunday the 10th December, she was officially honoured with the Nobel Peace Prize for “her fight against the oppression of women in Iran and her fight to promote human rights and freedom for all,” the Norwegian Nobel Committee announced in Oslo.
Unfortunately, Mohammadi wasn’t able to stand on the world stage in the historic Oslo City Hall to receive her award in person – because she is still imprisoned in Iran’s notorious Evin prison, on charges of anti-regime propaganda and threatening national security for her decades-long struggle for a free Iran.
Instead, her 17-year-old twins Ali and Kiana Rahmani have accepted the Peace Prize on her behalf.
CNN International Correspondent Jomana Karadsheh joined them ahead of the ceremony, as they got a first look at the room where they also presented Mohammadi’s Nobel Lecture, smuggled out of Evin prison.
“We are extremely proud of all that she’s done but what really saddens us today is that she is not here. Because we should not be the ones being interviewed, that’s my mother’s right,” Ali told CNN. “But we’ll do our best to be her voice and represent what is happening in Iran.”
The twins were not yet nine when they left Iran with their father for self-exile in Paris, after their mother was ripped away from them by the Iranian regime.
Reflecting on growing up without their mother, Kiana told Karadsheh: “Of course at some times in my life I would have liked to have her with me… I would have loved it if she could have taken me shopping, taught me how to wear makeup, to handle my body.”
The family says Mohammadi hasn’t been allowed to call them in nearly two years, and they are worried about her deteriorating health.
“I’m really not very optimistic about ever seeing her again,” says Kiana. “Whatever happens she’ll always be in my heart, and I accept that because the struggle, the movement, Woman Life Freedom, is worth it.”
“We are not just here for our family, but for freedom and democracy,” she adds. “We feel mostly proud, brave and determined, a determination we got mostly from our mother.”
The pain of separation from her family is one Mohammadi lives with every single day.
Karadsheh was able to ask her about that in an interview in August, conducted via intermediaries in Iran who helped relay Mohammadi’s responses in writing.
She wrote: “If I look at the prison through the window of my heart, I was more of a stranger to my daughter and son than any stranger ….. But I am sure that the world without freedom, equality and peace is not worth living …. I have chosen to not see my children or even hear their voices and be the voice of oppressed people, women and children, of my land.”