17 May 2010 | Index Index, Middle East and North Africa, minipost, Uncategorized
The Kuwaiti media have been banned from reporting on the dismantling of an Iranian spy network by prosecutor-general Hamed Saleh Al-Othman. The spy ring— which was publicly revealed on 1 May— was gathering information about Kuwaiti and US military bases on behalf of Iran’s Revolutionary Guards. Al-Othman told Al-Aan newspaper that he blocked further reporting of the case in order to allow the police and judicial authorities to investigate it without additional pressure. Reporters without Borders called the ban “a serious obstruction of investigative reporting.”
10 May 2010 | Middle East and North Africa, News and features
Maziar Bahari sentenced by Iran in absentia — 13 years and 6 months in jail and 74 lashes
The Canadian-Iranian reporter, Iran correspondent for Newsweek magazine, was released on bail by the Iranian authorities in October 2009 and left the country. Index on Censorship, Newsweek, Committee to Protect Journalists and Canadian Journalists for Free Expression campaigned for Bahari’s release after he was detained on 21 June 2009 in the aftermath of last year’s disputed presidential election during Iran’s post-election crackdown on the media. He discovered his sentence yesterday, after Iran’s security services informed his family.
Five years imprisonment for gathering and conspiring against the security of the state (for taking part in the demonstrations after the presidential election).
Four years for collecting and keeping secret and classified documents (for keeping a court document regarding Freedom Movement of Iran given to him by one of the leaders of the group).
One year for propagating against the system (for Bahari’s post-election Newsweek articles).
Two years for insulting the Supreme Leader (for a private e-mail he sent in which Bahari said Khamenei has learnt from the Shah’s mistakes).
Two years and 74 lashes for disrupting public order (for filming the Basij shooting at people).
Six months for insulting the president (for someone tagging a picture of Ahmadinejad kissing a boy on Bahari’s Facebook wall. The authorities said that the picture implied that the president was a homosexual).
Bahari expressed surprise that none of the charges he was interrogated over – including espionage, paving the way for a velvet revolution, contacts with Jews and Israelis, improper sexual conduct and connecting various reformist leaders to western governments – are mentioned in the sentence.
He suggested the sentence and the wave of other sentences and arrests made on the eve of the first anniversary of the election are supposed to scare people from taking part in the demonstrations, and from reporting them.
Bahari recently headed the Our Society Will Be A Free Society campaign, with events aimed at building pressure for the release of writers and journalists in prison in Iran.
27 Apr 2010 | Magazine, Middle East and North Africa, News and features
Writer and academic Fred Halliday died this week at the age of 64. Halliday, a keen analyst of Middle East and Iranian affairs, had been a contributor to Index on Censorship. In this article for Index from 2001, Halliday surveys the scene before Iran’s elections.
(more…)
21 Apr 2010 | Index Index, Middle East and North Africa, minipost, Uncategorized
Two political parties were suspended, a newspaper banned and three political figures sentenced to prison by the Iranian authorities on Monday. According to the official IRNA news agency, the Mujahedeen of the Islamic Revolution, the reformist group supporting Mr Hussein Moussavi, and the Islamic Iran Participation Front, a reformist political Iranian organ, have been suspended until their political status can be clarified. The reformist newspaper Bahar, formed just three months ago, has been banned. It was accused of spreading misinformation about last June’s elections and Iran’s Islamic system of government. Fars News reports that three politicians, Mostafa Tajzadeh, Davood Soleimani and Mohsen Mirdamadi, have been sentenced to six years in prison and a 10-year ban on all political or media activities.
