RSF: Regime Jails Journalist for 8 Years and Suspends Publication

          
          Reporters sans fflonti res - Iran
          Page 1 of2
          click on a sedion whats in it c41* s topii
          THENEWS
          I
          ANNUAL REPORT 2002
          PREDATORS
          THE BAROMETER
          . . . .
          ‘ Bu flue p.rters Wit!iout
          ,j i dei aIbuc*i af phatos...
          Print this rtict
          Search
          the judiciary and ensure
          the oLicial protector.
          IN THIS COUNTRY
          4 05.3 - Iran
          1 i i 4
          23rnpnt j iI and a 5 year
          pro-reform jd irnaIist
          04.23 - Iran
          ‘ abo Ei :
          A 04.. 17 -iran
          /V.cQkIy t editc
          tt 0 b flogged
          A 03.15 - Iran
          RSF COfl( erned dbJUt journ
          IN THE ANNUAL REPORT
          Iran annual Report 2
          MIDDLE-EAST PRESS RELI
          05.6 - Tunisia
          ,A ria.r j( 1 r aIi b
          pIaincIeU.m
          05.3 - Israel
          R5 .F del i &4 . r I se
          PalesI iniar'i ournaIists
          4 04.30 - Syria
          A,FP bure '
          4 04.25 - Israel
          RSF Is ‘f release o hhi
          Palest iian jo jrnaIistS
          4 04.. 1 - Aloeria
          ifiSr Urges EUr0l e2 0 UOiOfl I
          pressUre with 1 1 Fl'1i i jf EU
          agreement
          SIGN THE PETITIONS
          05.6 - Iran
          .d 05,6-Iran
          Akbar
          05.6 - Iran
          KIi l kostan.I {
          05.6 - Tunisia
          i-iamadi jebaii
          IRAN 05.7.2002
          Regime jails journalist for eight years and
          j:j j. t suspends more publications 4 04 29 - Iran
          Reporters Without Borders (Reporters
          sans fronti res - RSF) said today it was
          I'd epIy shocked at the eight-year jail
          sentence passed on an elderly and ailing
          Uranian journalist, Siamak Pourzand
          (see photo), 71, and called for his
          immediate release. It is outrageous to
          imprison a journalist of that age,
          speciaI1y when he is ill, said RSF
          cretary-general Robert M nard.
          He also expressed concern at the
          suspension of the countrys main
          reformist daily newspaper, Bonyan, and
          urged Iranian President Mohammad
          Khatami to block these steps taken by
          respect for the Constitution, of which he is
          Seven publications have been
          suspended in Iran since the beginning o
          the year. Despite the release today o
          journalist Ahmad Qabel, of Hayat-e . I
          No, eleven journalists are still
          imprisoned in Iran and the country's
          supreme spiritual leader, Ayatollah All ,
          Khamenei, Is on RSFs worldwide list of : ,
          predators of press freedom.
          Pourzand was sentenced on 3 May 2002 by the Teheran press court
          for having undermined state security through his links with
          monarchists and counter-revolutionaries He admitted all the charges
          and said he would not defend himself. RSF is concerned however that
          psychological pressure might have been used to force him to confess.
          He was seized by security police on 29 November last year and held
          in a secret place for four months without access to a lawyer or a
          doctor. As head of Teheran's artistic and cultural centre, he was also
          a cultural commentator for several reformist newspapers that have
          since been shut down.
          Ernad din 3agI '
          The daily paper Bonyan was suspended by the court on 4 May for
          many repeated offences and for using the name and logo of a
          weekly of the same name. Many banned journalists, including
          Atireza Alavitabar, editor-in-chief of the suspended paper Sobh--
          Emrouz, , and Ahmad Zeid-Abadi, of the pro-reform weekly
          Hamchahri, who was jailed for 23 months on 17 April, have written in
          Bonyan, which is popular in universities and has become a place for
          debate among reformists because of its stand against conservatives.
          SP00068
          http ://www. rsf. ffl/article.php3 ?id_article=2075
          5/7/2002
        

          
          Reporters sans fflonti res - Iran Page 2 of 2
          Also on 4 May, the reformist government daily Iran, which is
          controlled by the offlclal Iranian news agency IRNA, was suspended
          after publishing an article deemed offensive to the sacred principles
          of Islam. The next day, the head of the country s conservative
          )udiciary, Ayatollah Mahmud Hashemi Sharudi, ordered the
          suspension Iiified but said the paper would stlII be prosecuted.
          The oLeriding article was a review of a book by the writer Tuka
          Maleki about Iranian women musicians which scandalised the
          conservative clergy. Banafsheh Samgis, who wrote the review, and
          Mohsen Sharnazdar, editor of Iran 's music supplement, are being
          prosecuted and now risk arrest. Trans editor-in-chief, Abdoirassul
          Vessal, said the paper had received 96 formal complaints about
          material it had published.
          Reporters Without Borders defends imprisoned journalists and press freedom
          throughout the world, as well as the right to inform the public and to be
          informed, in accordance with Article 19 of the Universal Declaration of
          Human Rights. Reporters Without Borders has nine national sections (in
          Austria, Belgium, France, Germany, Italy, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, and
          the United Kingdom), representatives in Abidjan, Bangkok, Buenos Aires,
          Istanbul, Montreal, Moscow, New York, Tokyo and Washington and more
          than a hundred correspondents worldwide.
          Cont@ct
          Reporters without honiers
          http ://www.rsf.fr/artic le.php3 ?id_article=2075 5/7/2002