The death in custody of an ethnic Kurdish university student this month in the northwestern Iranian city of Sanandaj has prompted anger in Iran and international calls for an inquiry into his death.

The student, Ebrahim Lotfallahi, was picked up by intelligence officers on January 6 as he was leaving the Sanandaj campus of Payam Noor University, where he was a fourth-year law student.

Mr. Lotfallahi’s family visited him three days later and found him in good spirits, although it was not clear what charges had been brought against him, Human Rights Watch says in its account of the case. “On January 15, officials from the detention center contacted Lotfallahi’s parents and informed them that they had buried their son in a local cemetery. The officials claimed that Lotfallahi had committed suicide in his cell.”

Mr. Lotfallahi’s death “has angered student activists, who believe it is part of a campaign of harassment aimed at supressing dissent before the March elections,” The Telegraph, a British newspaper, reported today. “They say students in the Kurdish part of the country, which includes Sanandaj, have borne the brunt of the crackdown.” The paper also reported that Mr. Lotfallahi’s grave had been filled with cement, to prevent his body from being exhumed for examination.

Mr. Lotfallahi’s death followed the death last October in northwestern Iran of a 27-year-old female doctor, who also was in custody when officials claimed she had committed suicide.

On Wednesday the American government joined Human Rights Watch in calling for a full investigation of Mr. Lotfallahi’s death, the Reuters news agency reported.

A statement on the State Department’s Web site urged the Iranian government to “release all individuals held without due process and a fair trial” and singled out “three Amir Kabir University students that prison authorities refuse to free despite an order issued by an Iranian judge in late December.” —Aisha Labi