She Never Stopped Writing: The Story of Maryam Akbari Monfared
In the stillness of a prison cell, beneath flickering fluorescent lights and layers of silence, a woman keeps writing.
This is Maryam Akbari Monfared.
A mother. A sister. A political prisoner in Iran for over 14 years.
And she has never stopped writing.
In 2009, Maryam did what any grieving sister might do:
She asked why.
She wrote a letter demanding justice for her siblings—four of whom were executed during the 1988 prison massacre in Iran.
“Why were they killed?”
“Where are they buried?”
But that letter became her sentence.
She was arrested, disappeared, and has remained in prison ever since—without a single day of leave. Not one.
At the time of her arrest, Maryam was a young mother of three. Her youngest daughter was just four years old. Since then, she has missed every birthday. Every hug. Every bedtime story.
Her daughters grew up visiting their mother behind glass.
One of them recently said:
“I’m proud of my mother… but I miss her every day.”
For over 5,000 days and nights, Maryam has lived behind the walls of Evin and Semnan prisons.
She has been denied medical care. Denied visits. Denied freedom.
But she has never stopped writing.
Her letters—smuggled out in fragments—have become a lifeline for other grieving mothers, for the families of the disappeared, for truth itself.
Each word she writes resists the state’s demand for silence. Each sentence keeps memory alive.
Her story is not rare—but it is urgent. And her voice, though trapped behind bars, still reaches us.
We must answer.
What You Can Do:
Donate any amount: Keep her name alive and let her daughters know the world is listening.
Speak her name: Use the hashtag #FreeMaryamAkbari to bring global attention.
Join the call for her release: Contact rights groups and demand freedom for those punished for remembering.
Let no mother be punished for mourning. Let no woman be buried in silence.
