Iran: Political Prisoners Granted Furlough Despite Additional Arrests

Three reformist political prisoners, Mostafa Tajzadeh, Ghorbanali Behzadannejad and Javad Emam, were granted three-day furloughs in Iran.  Tajzadeh was a senior member of the Islamic Iran Participation Front and was arrested for participating in protests during the 2009 presidential elections.  He was sentenced to six years in prison.  Behzadannejad was sentenced to five years in prison for aiding presidential candidate Mir Hossein Moussavi.  Emam was sentenced to one year in prison for also aiding Moussavi.  A women’s rights website also reported that two women’s rights activists,  Mehrnoosh Etemadi and Hayedeh Tabesh, members of the One Million Signatures Campaign to End Discrimination, were given nine months in prison for “propaganda against the regime.” Human Rights Activist and Student Saeed Jalaifar was sentenced to three years in prison for propaganda against the regime.

Iranian PhD Student Omid Kokabee was arrested in Iran’s airport after visiting his family for “communicating with a hostile government and receiving illegal earnings.”  Kokabee was scheduled to go on trial in July, however his trial has been postponed indefinitely.  He is currently in Evin prison in Tehran.

According to the International Campaign for Human Rights in Iran, four cultural and literary figures detained last month in Gilan-e-Gharb were released on a $50,000 bail in the past two days.  However, the detention of four others was extended for another month.  Maryam Amini, Naeem Najafi, Jamal Khani and Sina Bijanpour had been charged with “propaganda against the regime” and each had spent a month in solitary confinement.  Sajjad Jahanfar, Ezzedin Heydari, Farhad Vakilinia and Maziar Mohammadi have been extended for a month and continue to remain at Kermanshah Intelligence Office Detention Center.

Amnesty International welcomed the release of about 70 prisoners of conscience and political prisoners “convicted of vaguely worded ‘security related’ charges including involvement” in the 2009 presidential elections. It was also reported that 1,218 other prisoners have been pardoned in a separate decree.  Amnesty International also reported that many prisoners, including lawyers, students and journalists, continue to endure poor conditions in Iran’s overcrowded prisons often leading to health concerns.