Editor of Kurdish-language weekly sentenced to 18 months in prison

Reporters Without Borders today condemned the 18-month prison sentence that was passed on Mohammad Sedigh Kabovand, the editor of Payam-e mardom-e Kurdestan, a weekly published in Kurdish and Farsi, for “upsetting public opinion and spreading separatist ideas.” The sentence has only now come to light although handed down on 18 August. “The fact that it has taken us two months to learn of Kabovand's sentence is a good illustration of the complete lack of transparency with which the Iranian authorities act, especially in the Kurdish part of the country, and the difficulty of getting information from a population that is reluctant to talk for fear of reprisals,” the press freedom organisation said. The sentence was handed down by a court in Sanandaj, in the western part of Iran's Kurdish region, which also imposed a five-year ban on Kabovand working as a journalist. The trial took place in the absence of his lawyer, Abdolfattah Soltani, himself arrested on 30 July on the orders of Tehran state prosecutor Said Mortazavi. A court in Sanandaj ordered the closure of Payam-e mardom-e Kurdestan on 27 June 2004 for “disseminating separatist ideas and publishing false reports.” -------------------------------------------------------------------------- 08.09.2005 Concern over fate of journalists detained in Kurdish part of Iran Reporters Without Borders today demanded the immediate release of four journalists who were arrested in the Kurdish part of Iran in late July and early August - Madh Amadi, Ejlal Ghavami, Roya Tolou and Said Saedi - and called on the authorities to explain their arrests. Only one of them, Ghavami, has so far been tried. “It is unacceptable that these journalists are being held with non-political prisoners, who are sometimes used by the authorities to harass or attack the political prisoners,” the press freedom organisation said, voicing particular concern about the state of health of Amadi and Ghavami, who are on hunger strike. A freelance journalist who works with several local media, Amadi was arrested on 28 July in the Sarvabad border area after visiting the Kurdish part of neighbouring Irak. Now held in the main prison of the city of Marivan, he is still awaiting trial. He began a hunger strike on 1 September in protest against his detention, which he considers illegal. The reason for his arrest is not known, but it could be linked to his investigation of a massacre of residents in the village of Garna (in the Kurdish part of Iran) in the 1980s. Many documents about the massacre which he had collected were seized at the time of his arrest. The three other journalists were arrested because of their coverage of recent disturbances in Iran's Kurdish-dominated northwestern region. Ghavami, who works for the weekly Payam-e mardom-e Kurdestan, was arrested on 2 August and was tried by the court of the city Sanandaj on 29 August on charges of “inciting the populations to revolt” and “acting against national security.” He was then transferred to the non-political prisoners wing of the prison. He began his hunger strike on 31 August. In a letter he managed to get out to his family, he said, “my life is in danger.” Tolo, the editor of the newspaper Resan, was formally placed in custody on 9 August pending trial. The authorities refused to release her on bail, and she has also been put in a cell with non-political prisoners. The third journalist being held without trial, Saedi, is a freelancer who occasionally works for the weekly Asou. -------------------------------------------------------------------------- 12.08.2005 Crackdown on journalists continues in Iran's Kurdish-dominated northwest The authorities in Sanandaj have ordered that three journalists arrested at the start of August for covering the disturbances of the past few weeks in Iran's Kurdish-dominated northwestern region should be kept in custody for two months. A third journalist who was arrested this morning, Hossin Ahamadi Niaz, was released later in the day on bail. "We condemn the provisional custody orders issued for Roya Tolou, Ejlal Ghavami and Said Saedi, and we call on the authorities in Sanandaj to stop persecuting journalists who are courageous enough to cover demonstrations," Reporters Without Borders said. Tolou, the editor of the newspaper Resan, was arrested by in Sanandaj on 1 August and placed in custody on 8 August. Ghavami, a reporter with the weekly Payam-e mardom-e Kurdestan, and Saedi, a freelance journalist who occasionally works for the weekly Asou, were placed in custody on 2 August. Niaz, the editor of the weekly Aso, is one of the many journalists who have been summoned one by one to appear before Sanandaj's revolutionary court. When he appeared before the court this morning, he was detained for several hours and then freed after paying the exorbitant amount of 90,000 euros in bail. What is happening now in Iran's Kurdish region was preceded by similar events a few months ago in the southern province of Khozestan. Coverage of the latest events prompted the closure on 9 August of the weekly Sotalsha'ab, the province's only newspaper published in both Farsi and Arabic, on the orders of the ministry of culture and Islamic guidance. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- 05.08.2005 Crackdown on Kurdish press following clashes in Kurdistan Reporters Without Borders today condemned a wave of harassment of Kurdish journalists by local authorities in Iranian Kurdistan, which has been hit by clashes in recent weeks, and the closure of the daily Achti and the weekly Asou at the behest of the ministry of culture and Islamic guidance. "We condemn this crackdown on the Kurdish press because Iranian Kurdistan has more need than ever of its journalists in these times of great tension," the press freedom organisation said. "We call on the authorities to stop the harassment of Kurdish journalists and to lift the suspension of Achti and Asou." Asou, which is published in both Kurdish and Farsi, was closed by judicial officials in Sanandaj (the capital of Kurdistan) on 3 August, probably because of its editorial line and its coverage of the events shaking the region. The closure of Achti followed, probably for the same reasons. Published in Tehran in Kurdish, it had recently received permission to change from a weekly to a daily. The source of the orders for the closure of both newspapers was the ministry of culture and Islamic guidance. Several journalists are known to have been arrested but, given the many arrests that have taken place in the region, many more are probably being held. Roya Tolou, the editor of the newspaper Resan, was detained by police in Sanandaj on 2 August. Ejlal Ghavami, a journalist with the weekly Payam-e mardom-e Kurdestan, was also arrested the same day. Other journalists have been summoned to appear before local authorities for reasons that are unknown but probably related to reports published in the past few weeks. Mohammad Sadegh Kabovand, Payam-e mardom-e Kurdestan's editor, was asked to appear before a court in Sanandaj yesterday. He did appear but without his lawyer, who is none other than Abdolfattah Soltani, who was arrested on the orders of Tehran prosecutor Said Mortazavi on 30 July. This is not the first time Kabovand has been harassed by local judicial officials. He was arrested and taken before a court in Sanandaj on 15 June 2004 for "spreading separatist ideas and publishing false reports" and the court ordered the closure of his newspaper two weeks later.