Two imprisoned bloggers allowed to make home visits

Jailed bloggers Arash Sigarchi and Mojtaba Saminejad have been let out of prison temporarily for home visits. Sigarchi was released on 7 June to spend two weeks at home. Saminejad was let out on 1 June for a 10-day home visit that was later extended by a month. A third Iranian blogger, Abed Tavancheh, who was arrested in Tehran on 26 May, is still being held in Evin prison. ----------------------------- 15.02.2006 Weblogger Mojtaba Saminejad has spent one year in detention Student blogger Mojtaba Saminejad has spent more than one year in prison in Tehran, said Reporters Without Borders, calling for his immediate release and that of one other blogger currently behind bars in Iran. This 25-year-old student was arrested on 12 February 2005 and sentenced to two years in prison by a revolutionary court for “insulting the Supreme Guide”. One month later he was given a further ten months for incitement to “immorality” “The Iranian authorities sentence and imprison people like criminals when they are merely expressing their opinion on the Internet”, the worldwide press freedom organisation said. “This draconian policy is unacceptable and we call for the immediate release of the two bloggers who are currently imprisoned in Iran, Mojtaba Saminejad and Arash Sigarchi" . Saminejad was arrested for the first time, in November 2004, for using his blog to condemn the arrest of three colleagues. Released in January 2005, he was returned to prison on 12 February 2005 after putting his blog back online. Sigarchi has been in prison since 26 January 2006 after being sentenced to three years in prison on the same charge as Mojtaba - "insulting the Supreme Guide". Reporters Without Borders also expressed its sympathy to Arash Sigarchi and his family after the death of his brother in a car accident on 9 January. The young man was on his way to the prison in Rashat to take Arash his request for an appeal before the Supreme Court that his lawyers had prepared for him. ------------- Create your blog with Reporters without borders: www.rsfblog.org