Iranian Seyed Hashem Alavi was five when the Pahlavi monarchy was overthrown and the Islamic Republic of Iran was established in 1979.

Alavi, who’s served time in prisons in Iran, Iraq, Pakistan, and Afghanistan, is now seeking asylum in Armenia.

“Please listen to my story,” Alavi tells me and begins to chronicle the story of his fifty-year life.

He says that his life dramatically changed after his father, a literature teacher in the Iranian city of Bushehr, was accused of having ties to the Shah’s security agency SAVAK following the 1979 revolution.

“Our family found itself in an extremely difficult situation. My father was dismissed from his job on false charges of being a member of SAVAK,” Alavi tells me.

The family faced another tragedy when his younger brother was kidnapped and murdered.

“If the family had been protected by the state, this would not have happened. This incident brought final misfortune to our persecuted family,” says Alavi.

He says that aged twenty, he was drafted into the armed forces of the Islamic Republic of Iran.  Eight months into his service, Alavi says he was given a diagnosis of schizophrenia and discharged after he complained about the abuses he suffered in the military.

That diagnosis, he says, would haunt him throughout his life.

“I did everything I could to prove that I was not sick and that I deserved to live as a normal citizen who could work, have a driver’s license, and start a family,” says Alavi. 

These attempts failed, forcing him to leave Iran for a new life elsewhere.

At the age of thirty, Alavi fled to Iraq to seek help from international organizations. He was arrested for illegally crossing the border and spent two years in prison. From Iraq, he was extradited to Iran, where he was arrested again, interrogated, and released.

Alavi then left for Pakistan and then Afghanistan. In these countries, he also faced uncertainty, imprisonment, and physical and psychological pressure. Upon returning to Iran, he was arrested again and interrogated. He was banned from leaving the country for five years.

“My difference from other people with schizophrenia is that I have been in prisons and tortured for years, and my only crime was that I said I am not mentally ill, or at least I do not have schizophrenia.”

Alavi is now in Armenia, desperate for help. In November, he contacted the UN Refugee Agency in Armenia, the Migration Service, the Red Cross, and other organizations. He was told  that he could only receive help when he officially filled   an asylum application. He has an appointment tomorrow at the Migration Service to apply.

"Imagine what a disaster it would be if the rulers of your country had the ability to arbitrarily declare a citizen mentally ill at any time," says Alavi, who, having gone through a long journey of trials and tribulations, now hopes to receive help from Armenia.