(RSF/IFEX) – RSF has voiced outrage over the suspended one-year jail sentence that Tehran’s Sixth Revolutionary Court has given journalist Emadoldin Baghi. The court did not offer an explanation for the sentence. RSF also called on the Iranian courts to give assurances as to the state of health of Iradj Jamshidi, editor-in-chief of the economic […]
(RSF/IFEX) – RSF has voiced outrage over the suspended one-year jail sentence that Tehran’s Sixth Revolutionary Court has given journalist Emadoldin Baghi. The court did not offer an explanation for the sentence.
RSF also called on the Iranian courts to give assurances as to the state of health of Iradj Jamshidi, editor-in-chief of the economic daily “Asia”. There has been no news of his fate since his 6 July 2003 arrest and incarceration in Tehran’s Evin prison.
Baghi, who previously worked for “Neshat”, a daily that was closed by the authorities, was tried on 9 November, but his sentence was only announced on 4 December.
Baghi’s suspended sentence could be converted to an actual prison sentence at any time during the next five years. This threat is clearly an attempt to silence the journalist, who often writes about free expression violations in Iran for the reformist dailies “Shargh” and “Yas-e-no”.
“I was unable to defend myself in this travesty of a trial, which lasted only a few minutes, and I was barely able to speak,” Baghi told RSF. “What kind of trial is it where there is neither a lawyer nor a judge, or where the judge is also the prosecutor, and where the defendant is not even told of the charges against him?”
In his book, “The Tragedy of Democracy in Iran,” Baghi accused the Iranian authorities of being involved in a series of murders of intellectuals and journalists in 1998. He was previously incarcerated because of his articles in the reformist press. In his most recent previous trial, on 23 October 2000, he was given a three-year prison sentence for “threatening national security” and “disseminating false news” (see IFEX alerts of 10 June and 11 February 2003, 18 July, 30 May and 7 April 2000).
After his release on 6 February 2003, Baghi was repeatedly harassed by the judicial authorities, summoned frequently to appear in court and barred from leaving the country. The harassment stepped up after the November visit to Tehran by Ambeyi Ligabo, special rapporteur on freedom of opinion and expression for the United Nations Commission on Human Rights.
In addition, RSF is concerned about the fate of 11 journalists who are currently imprisoned in Iran. In addition to Jamshidi, they include the following three journalists, who were each arrested on 14 June: Taghi Rahmani, of “Omid-é-Zangan”; Reza Alijani, editor-in-chief of “Iran-é-Farda”, who is also an RSF-Fondation de France laureate; and Hoda Saber, managing editor of “Iran-é-Farda”.
Rahmani’s wife, Narges Mohammadi, told RSF, “The last family visit for the three journalists was on 30 October. Since then, and for the past 32 days, neither their lawyers nor their families have received any news of them. We still don’t know the charges under which they are being held. They have not yet been brought to trial and have been in preventive detention for six months.”
