Video clip: Names and faces of 17 political prisoners on hunger strike

Prison officials transferred the seventeen to solitary confinement on Monday July 26, after they complained about prison conditions. As of August 5, three of the prisoners had begun a "dry" hunger strike, refusing to eat or drink anything. Since the the beginning of the hunger strike, several of the prisoners have been taken to the prison clinic for treatment with serum, but returned to their cells shortly after. Human Rights Watch has said that "Several of the 17 suffer from medical conditions that require vigilant care, such as diabetes, multiple sclerosis, and heart disease."

The seventeen hunger strikers are: Bahman Ahmadi Amoui, Gholam Hossein Arshi, Ebrahim Babaei, Babak Bordbar, Majid Darri, Jafar Eghdami, Koohyar Goodarzi, Peyman Karimi-Azad, Ali Malihi, Abdollah Momeni, Hamid Reza Mohammadi, Zia Nabavi, Hossein Nouraninejad, Ali Parviz, Keyvan Samimi, Mohammad Hossein Sohrabirad, and Majid Tavakoli. They include journalists, civil society activists, student activists, human rights activists, political opposition members, and Iran-Iraq war veterans. Human Rights Watch has documented the government's arbitrary targeting, arrest, and detention of several of these prisoners for their political activities during the past few years.