SANDY — It’s been rough the past several months for Masoud Nourmohammadi, now living in Sandy, and his family members back in Iran.

Two of his cousins, twin sisters Taraneh and Romina Rahimi, were jailed in Iran last January for taking part in anti-government protests and have faced beatings, rape and more.

Since Sunday, when Taraneh was sentenced to death, it’s been nearly unbearable. Romina received a 25-year prison sentence, and the cases of the two sisters, now 20, and the others arrested with them have garnered attention from a range of international news organizations.

“It’s terrible. It’s been hard. Last eight months has been just extremely hard on everyone in the family. And especially in the last two days, it’s been unspeakable,” said Nourmohammadi, a naturalized U.S. citizen who now manages technology for a health company.

He decided he needed to publicly speak out to bring attention to his cousins’ cases in a bid to help them. He’s also going to reach out to Utah’s congressional delegation to Washington, D.C., for support.

“My hope out of these conversations is just to let the communities know … what’s going on Iran to begin with,” he said. “And then I really hope for the political sponsorship from a center or government or someone who cares about the girls.”

The two young women are being held in a prison in Isfahan, the Iranian city where they took part in protests against the nation’s clerical government on Jan. 8 and 9, part of numerous protests that erupted around the nation. Nourhohammadi said they finally have access to a team of human rights lawyers that will attempt to appeal Taraneh’s death sentence, but he’s not sure what to expect.

“They have a strong case that these girls … they didn’t do anything that’s against the law. They were just protesting in the street peacefully. There’s no evidence against them,” he said. “But … government is, you never know. They don’t even follow their own rules.”

The cases of the two sisters and several others arrested with them have garnered attention from Radio Free Europe, The Times of Israel and the Hengaw Organization for Human Rights, based in Norway.

“The defendants were tried on charges including ‘moharebeh (waging war against God) through carrying bladed weapons,’ ‘destruction of public property,’ ‘assembly and collusion’ and ‘propaganda against the state,'” Hengaw said in a post on Monday. Hengaw said Taraneh and nine other people were sentenced to death and 11 years imprisonment and that Romina and six others face up to 36 years imprisonment each.

Protesting in Iran against the nation’s repressive government late last year and early this year drew headlines around the world. President Donald Trump sent U.S. forces to attack the nation’s government on Feb. 28, teaming with Israeli forces. Though the ongoing military campaign killed supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei and other top Iranian officials, Nourmohammadi said the repression of the Iranian government continues.

The protesting in Isfahan last January came amid demonstrating all around the country originally rooted in soaring inflation, government mismanagement and a decline in living conditions, according to Amnesty International, a human rights organization.

“Soon, more people joined and protests turned into mass nationwide street demonstrations calling for the end of the Islamic Republic system. Protesters are demanding fundamental change and transition to a new system of government that respects peoples’ human rights and dignity,” according to Amnesty.

Nourmohammadi said any violence during the demonstrations came from government forces, while Amnesty said “thousands” died in the protests stemming from backlash by Iranian authorities. “Peaceful protesting from people, but (government forces) started killing them on the streets, shooting at them with machine guns,” Nourmohammadi said.

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The two sisters were abducted from their home a week or so after the protesting, and for about four months, their family members didn’t know where they were. Finally in May, their mother — Nourmohammadi’s aunt on his mother’s side of the family — was permitted to visit them at the prison in Isfahan where they are being held.

“They were beaten, tortured, broken legs, swollen faces. They basically had no hair because they grabbed them by hair and then they lost all of their hair,” he said. The sisters had been tortured and raped.

Family members in Iran have been facing death threats, Nourmohammadi said, and he has as well since speaking out on the matter. His mom, the aunt of the two sisters, lives with him in Utah, and she’s been inconsolable, constantly crying. Meantime, the clock is ticking for Taraneh to appeal her death sentence.

“We can appeal in the next 16 days, and that’s what the lawyers are working on,” he said.

The Key Takeaways for this article were generated with the assistance of large language models and reviewed by our editorial team. The article, itself, is solely human-written.