speechlesstx
Mar 8, 2008, 06:37 AM
Iranian-American Haleh Esfandiari, ambushed by three masked, knife-wielding men that stole her luggage and passports after visiting her 93 year old mother, was interrogated, arrested and held in an Iranian prison last year. Iran is at it again:
A journalist who works for a U.S.-funded radio outlet has been convicted by an Iranian court of spreading anti-state propaganda and sentenced to one year in prison (http://www.iht.com/articles/ap/2008/03/03/europe/EU-GEN-Czech-Iran-Radio-Free-Europe.php), her company said Monday.
Iranian-American Parnaz Azima was not in Iran during the court action Saturday. She now has the difficult choice of deciding whether to return to Tehran, where she had to forfeit the deed to her mother's home to raise the bail needed to be released from custody.
Azima, who is based in Prague, was found guilty by Tehran's 13th Revolutionary Court of "spreading propaganda against the Islamic Republic" by working for the "anti-revolutionary" Radio Farda, the Persian service of Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, the broadcaster said.
In an e-mail statement sent to The Associated Press, the broadcaster said three other charges against Azima had been dropped: acting against Iran's national interests, earning illegitimate income and owning a satellite receiver.
"She is guilty of nothing more or less than doing her job as a professional journalist," said Jeffrey Gedmin, the president of Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty.
Azima traveled to Tehran last year to visit her sick mother and was kept in Iran for months after Iranian authorities seized her passport in January. Four months later, Azima was charged with security-related offenses, an accusation she denied.
The journalist had her passport returned in September and was allowed to leave Iran after posting bail using her 95-year-old mother's house.
Azima now must decide whether to return to Iran to serve her one-year sentence or to forfeit the deed to her mother's home, which was turned over to Iranian authorities in lieu of US$550,000 (€360,000) in bail, said Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty.
"Now, the very real possibility exists that her mother may be put out onto the street by the Iranian government," Gedmin said.
Azima's lawyer in Tehran, Mohammad Hossein Aghassi, has 20 days to appeal the verdict, the media company said.
Let's hear the outrage, big time. I'm especially interested to see if whatever women's rights groups still around can get over their hatred of Bush and take the lead on this and against oppression of women by Islamofascists everywhere. Or will they just follow in Gloria Steinem's footsteps and mock McCain (http://www.observer.com/2008/stumping-clinton-steinem-says-mccains-p-o-w-cred-overrated)? It seems to me feminists have been eerily silent in the battle for women's rights in the Muslim world (http://www.frontpagemag.com/Articles/Read.aspx?GUID=E3A6C5FE-3F1C-410D-B19D-F57BE14B4034), and they left in general has been so obsessed with Bush that Islamofacists are getting a pass.
A journalist who works for a U.S.-funded radio outlet has been convicted by an Iranian court of spreading anti-state propaganda and sentenced to one year in prison (http://www.iht.com/articles/ap/2008/03/03/europe/EU-GEN-Czech-Iran-Radio-Free-Europe.php), her company said Monday.
Iranian-American Parnaz Azima was not in Iran during the court action Saturday. She now has the difficult choice of deciding whether to return to Tehran, where she had to forfeit the deed to her mother's home to raise the bail needed to be released from custody.
Azima, who is based in Prague, was found guilty by Tehran's 13th Revolutionary Court of "spreading propaganda against the Islamic Republic" by working for the "anti-revolutionary" Radio Farda, the Persian service of Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, the broadcaster said.
In an e-mail statement sent to The Associated Press, the broadcaster said three other charges against Azima had been dropped: acting against Iran's national interests, earning illegitimate income and owning a satellite receiver.
"She is guilty of nothing more or less than doing her job as a professional journalist," said Jeffrey Gedmin, the president of Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty.
Azima traveled to Tehran last year to visit her sick mother and was kept in Iran for months after Iranian authorities seized her passport in January. Four months later, Azima was charged with security-related offenses, an accusation she denied.
The journalist had her passport returned in September and was allowed to leave Iran after posting bail using her 95-year-old mother's house.
Azima now must decide whether to return to Iran to serve her one-year sentence or to forfeit the deed to her mother's home, which was turned over to Iranian authorities in lieu of US$550,000 (€360,000) in bail, said Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty.
"Now, the very real possibility exists that her mother may be put out onto the street by the Iranian government," Gedmin said.
Azima's lawyer in Tehran, Mohammad Hossein Aghassi, has 20 days to appeal the verdict, the media company said.
Let's hear the outrage, big time. I'm especially interested to see if whatever women's rights groups still around can get over their hatred of Bush and take the lead on this and against oppression of women by Islamofascists everywhere. Or will they just follow in Gloria Steinem's footsteps and mock McCain (http://www.observer.com/2008/stumping-clinton-steinem-says-mccains-p-o-w-cred-overrated)? It seems to me feminists have been eerily silent in the battle for women's rights in the Muslim world (http://www.frontpagemag.com/Articles/Read.aspx?GUID=E3A6C5FE-3F1C-410D-B19D-F57BE14B4034), and they left in general has been so obsessed with Bush that Islamofacists are getting a pass.