20 journalists in prison, dozens summoned in continued press crackdown

Reporters Without Borders said today the plight of Iran's journalists was worsening, with further arrests, police summonses and threats, while the country's hardline rulers continued to obstruct investigation of the detention death of Iranian-Canadian photographer Zahra Kazemi. Issa Saharkhiz, reformist editor of the monthly magazine Aftab (Soleil), was summoned on 26 August by the 7th division of the Teheran prosecutor's office and interrogated about alleged statements about him made to police by Iraj Jamshidi, editor of the suspended business daily Assia, who was arrested in mid-July. The hardline paper Resalat had accused him the previous day of corruption. On the day of his summons, Saharkhiz had posted a letter on the Internet threatening to sue the paper and Ayatollah Hashemi Shahrudi, head of the conservative-dominated judiciary. He had earlier been arrested and jailed on 15 July for "making propaganda against the regime." He was freed on bail two days later. Several journalists have been summoned in recent days by the Adareh Amaken section of the Teheran police that deals with "ethical" offences and is controlled by Teheran prosecutor Judge Said Mortazavi. Amirrezza Noorisadeh, who works for the newspapers Mosigi Magam and Cinamye Jahan, has been forced to report to police every day for the past week. Mostafa Kovakabian, editor of the reformist daily Mardomsalari (Democracy), was summoned on 17 August and put under investigation on three counts of publishing articles about the Kazemi case. More than 50 journalists were summoned between mid-July and mid-August (during the Persian month of Mordad), according to Reporters Without Borders. The current risky situation for journalists was shown by the 16 August kidnapping of Hassan Raghifar, the elderly editor of the regional weekly Asan (in the northern city of Tabriz), who was tortured by his four kidnappers who interrogated him about his work and threatened to kill him for what had written. His paper had reported on the arrest and torture of journalists. There is still no word of Iraji Jamshidi or of Ismaeli Jamshidi, editor of the suspended newspaper Gardon, who were arrested on 6 and 7 July. But Amir Ezati, of Mahnameh Film, was freed on 30 June after 123 days in prison, 60 of them in solitary confinement, after being accused of translating and distributing Salman Rushdie's book "Satanic Verses," which is banned in Iran. During a search of his house, police found an extract from the book that Ezati had printed out from an Internet website. His trial has been set for mid-September. Iran is the biggest prison for journalists in the Middle East, with 20 presently detained.