Qom Prison

Qom Central Prison emerged alongside Ghezel Hesar as a documented site of secret political executions in the 18 days between 19 March and 6 April 2026. Iran Human Rights Monitor confirmed at least 14 executions across the two prisons, conducted without family notification under cover of a 1,008-hour nationwide internet blackout , the longest ever recorded. Prisoners transferred there during the conflict included political detainees moved from Evin Prison after NOPO (Iran's special forces riot police) seized control of Evin in the early weeks of the war.

Qom is Iran's holiest city and its primary centre of Shia Islamic scholarship. The prison is a provincial facility serving Iran's religious heartland , a city that produces senior clerics including members of the Assembly of Experts that selects the Supreme Leader. The use of a Qom facility for political executions reflects the Islamic Republic's comfort using even its most symbolically charged geography for coercive purposes.

The transfer of political prisoners from Evin to Qom and Ghezel Hesar during the conflict suggests a deliberate dispersal strategy: spreading detainees across facilities reduces the risk of mass release or escape in a single event, while also obscuring the overall population from human rights monitors. The internet blackout eliminated the informal notification networks that families normally rely on to track transfers and sentencing.