(RSF/IFEX) – The following is a RSF press release: Iran The biggest jail for journalists in the world RSF launches a petition in support of reformist press Following two new arrests of journalists on 12 and 13 August 2000, Reporters Sans Frontières (RSF) has launched a petition on its website www.rsf.fr calling for “the immediate […]
(RSF/IFEX) – The following is a RSF press release:
Iran
The biggest jail for journalists in the world
RSF launches a petition in support of reformist press
Following two new arrests of journalists on 12 and 13 August 2000, Reporters Sans Frontières (RSF) has launched a petition on its website www.rsf.fr calling for “the immediate release of imprisoned journalists, the lifting of legal proceedings against the journalists, the lifting of bans on newspapers and the repeal of the press law”. A chronology of the arrests of journalists and the banning of newspapers, since April 2000, is also available on the website.
The arrests of journalists Ibrahim Nabavi and Mohammad Ghoutchani bring the number of journalists in prison in Iran to fourteen. “Iran’s supreme leader, Ayatollah Khamenei, made his country the biggest jail for journalists in the world” deplored Robert Ménard, the RSF secretary general who stated on 7 August that Ayatollah Khamenei, was “one of the twenty most dangerous predators of press freedom recorded by RSF”. Sixteen others journalists prosecuted by the Iranian Justice ministry may be arrested in the next few weeks. In five months, twenty-five reformist publications have been banned. The press law, passed in April 2000, by a conservative parliament, is particularly liberticidal.
On 12 August 2000, Ibrahim Nabavi, journalist with numerous reformist publications: Jameh, Tous and Asr-é-Azadegan, was arrested after being interrogated by the Press Court. The journalist had already been arrested in 1999 after several complaints were lodged against him, especially for his satiric articles aimed at the conservative establishment.
On 13 August, Mohammad Ghoutchani, journalist with Asr-é-Azadegan, was arrested. Several complaints were lodged against him by the police, a fundamentalist group and officials. In April, Mohammad Ghoutchani denounced the banning, by the Iranian court, of numerous reformist newspapers.
