Iran: Human Rights Watch Condemns Arrest of Iranian-American This woman has now been formally charged with "trying to topple the Iranian government". The Iranian Government are afraid of Haleh Esfandiari! http://www.iht.com/articles/ap/2007/0...
On May 8, officials at the Iranian Ministry of Intelligence summoned Haleh Esfandiari for questioning, arrested her without warrant or explanation, and transferred her to Tehran's notorious Evin prison, where Human Rights Watch has documented cases of torture and detainee abuse. Prior to Esfandiari's arrest, ministry officials had repeatedly interrogated her in their offices on Africa Street in Tehran, and subsequently in their main building on Khaje Abdollah Ansari Street. Esfandiari, who is head of the Middle East program at the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars in Washington, had traveled to Iran in December to visit her ailing mother. On December 30, prior to her planned departure from Iran, armed and masked men stopped her taxi and seized both her Iranian and US passports. Since December, Iranian authorities have failed to replace her passport and instead have subjected her to repeated and protracted interrogation sessions. In a statement on May 10, the Wilson Center said that during interrogations, Esfandiari "was pressured to make a false confession or to falsely implicate the Wilson Center in activities in which it had no part." "President Ahmadinejad is desperately trying to discredit his government's many critics as American pawns," said Joe Stork, deputy Middle East director at Human Rights Watch. "Haleh Esfandiari is a well-known advocate of dialogue between Iranian and American scholars, and the Iranian authorities are trying to coerce her into making a false confession to incriminate Iranian writers and activists."
News | 176 Views Added By: Yodyo on Aug 2 2007 at 2:36 pm
