Man Who Was Imprisoned in Iran for Posting Jokes on Facebook Denied Timely Appeal Verdict

منتشرشده در ژوئیه 9, 2016

Soheil Babadi has written an open letter detailing the torture he experienced during interrogations.

Computer engineer Soheil Babadi, who was imprisoned in Iran for posting jokes on a satirical Facebook page, has been waiting close to a year for a ruling on his appeal against his prison sentence. The authorities have meanwhile refused to release him on bail or allow him to receive medical treatment outside of Rajaee Shahr Prison in Karaj (west of Tehran) where he has been held in Ward 12—where political prisoners are kept—since October 1, 2014.

An informed source told the International Campaign for Human Rights in Iran that Babadi’s appeal was filed more than 10 months ago, and that the Appeals Court last looked into his case in April 2016, but “the case judge has neither issued a verdict nor agreed to release Babadi on bail.”

“Those in charge of this case have deliberately prolonged Babadi’s prosecution,” added the source. “Now he needs to go on medical furlough [temporary leave] to get treatment for his kidney problem, but the officials refuse to allow him until he gets a final verdict.”

Political prisoners in Iran are singled out for harsh treatment, which often includes denial of medical care.

After his arrest on May 22, 2012, Babadi, 39, was held for more than 200 days in Ward 2-A of Tehran’s Evin Prison, which is controlled by the Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps (IRGC). During that time he was tortured and denied basic rights, according to an open letter he wrote from prison on September 7, 2013.

“In May 2011 I posted ten short pieces of satire on a Facebook page called the ‘Campaign to Remind Shiites about Imam Naghi’ without using any insulting words,” said the letter. “A year later I was arrested by the IRGC’s Intelligence Organization without a warrant and held in Ward 2-A, the IRGC’s exclusive detention center, and beaten and interrogated for 24 hours.”

Babadi continued: “Then someone named Ghena’atkar (from Branch 3 of the Security Court) formally read the charges against me, including ‘insulting the Prophet Mohammad,’ ‘insulting the sacred,’ ‘assembly and collusion,’ ‘insulting the supreme leader,’ ‘propaganda against the state,’ ‘membership in a group planning to overthrow the state’ ‘and acting against national security’—all for writing ten jokes on Facebook.”

“I was interrogated while blindfolded in the corner of a room,” he added. “The agent wanted me to confess to the charges against me, and when I refused he severely beat me. I was constantly under psychological pressure as the agents probed into my personal life and tried to accuse me of sexual relations with friends and relatives, even with my sister-in-law, and even of homosexual relations with one of my friends, Mostafa. But they didn’t succeed and kept me in solitary confinement for 225 days.”

The practice of forced “confessions” in Iran, including those elicited under torture or the threat of torture, has been well documented by international human rights organizations.

Babadi indicated in his letter that his basic rights were denied primarily because his jokes were turned into a security case. During his interrogation his back was injured after severe beatings, he was held incommunicado for months in solitary confinement, and he was detained for a year before his first trial.

Babadi was arrested in 2012 after allegedly posting jokes on the “Campaign to Remind Shiites about Imam Naghi” Facebook page, which satirizes political and religious issues while focusing on Ali al-Naghi—the tenth Imam according to Shia Islam. The page, which has nearly 33,000 fans, gained popularity after the song “Naghi” by musical artist Shahin Najafi went viral in early May 2012 and at least two senior theologians issued fatwas calling for Najafi’s death for insulting Naghi.

Babadi was first charged with “insulting the sacred” and “insulting President [Mahmoud Ahmadinejad],” and sentenced to five-and-a-half years in prison, 74 lashes and two years in exile in the city of Beshagard near the southern port of Bandar Abbas.

In a second trial in September 2015 Judge Mohammad Moghisseh of Branch 28 of the Revolutionary Court sentenced Babadi to an additional seven years in prison for “assembly and collusion against national security” and “insulting the supreme leader.” Branch 26 of the Appeals Court has yet to issue a verdict on the appeal against Babadi’s sentence.

All of the charges against Babadi relate to his Facebook posts. If Article 134 of Iran’s New Islamic Penal Code is applied to his case, his combined sentence could be reduced to seven-and-a-half years in prison and he could be released on probation after four years.

Prominent Political Prisoner Promised, Though Still Not Allowed, Phone Contact with Children

منتشرشده در ژوئیه 9, 2016 به‌روزرسانی شده در ژوئیه 9, 2016

Taghi Rahmani believes his wife Narges Mohammadi is being mistreated in prison because he fled the country years ago.

Iran’s judicial authorities have promised to lift a ban on phone calls between prominent human rights activist Narges Mohammadi and her children, but she has still not been allowed to speak to her kids. Mohammadi, who has only been allowed to speak with her children once since being detained in May 2015, began a wet hunger strike in Evin Prison in Tehran on June 27, 2016 to protest the ban.

“Two days after my wife went on hunger strike, a judicial official met with her and said the Judiciary does not have a problem with her contacting her children but that this is a security issue and the decision is up to security officials,” Mohammadi’s husband, Taghi Rahmani, told the International Campaign for Human Rights in Iran. “He said the issue would definitely be resolved, but so far nothing has happened and Narges is still unable to contact her children.”

Rahmani, who currently lives in Paris with the couple’s young twin children, Ali and Kiana, told the Campaign that one reason his wife is not being allowed to contact her family is because Iran’s judicial authorities consider him a “fugitive.”

In 2012 Rahmani indicated in an open letter that he published after leaving Iran that he has served more than a decade in prison since the country’s 1979 revolution. He was also an active member of the 2009 presidential campaign of Mehdi Karroubi, who has been living under extrajudicial house arrest for over five years for contesting the result of that year’s widely disputed election. Rahmani fled Iran because he feared being imprisoned again for his political beliefs. His children were sent to live with him in Paris after his wife began serving her sentence because there was no one left in Iran to care for them.

Rahmani added that his wife, who has lost consciousness twice since starting her hunger strike, was taken to the hospital on July 3, 2016 to undergo tests. “Narges has become extremely weak… we are very worried for her,” he said.

Mohammadi is being held in Evin Prison’s Women’s Ward where there are no public phones. “This is a great injustice because the inmates there are unable to contact their relatives by phone,” said Rahmani.

Political prisoners held in the Women’s Ward at Evin Prison are routinely denied proper medical care and hospitalization, face restricted or denied visitation rights even with their young children, are deprived of regular telephone contact with their families, and are not provided adequate nutrition, a recent report by the Campaign has revealed.

“I am asking for nothing other than being allowed to talk to my children on the phone. If this demand is too great, irrational, immoral, unlawful, or against national security, please let me know. Convince me, please. Clarify why a mother, declared a criminal by the state, must be denied hearing the voices of her children,” said Mohammadi in an open letter about her hunger strike.

Mohammadi, the former spokesperson of the now banned Defenders of Human Rights Center and winner of the 2011 Per Anger Prize for her activism in human rights, was sentenced in May 2016 to serve 10 years of a 16-year prison term for “membership in the [now banned] Step by Step to Stop the Death Penalty,” “assembly and collusion against national security” and “propaganda against the state.”

In October 2011 she was sentenced to 11 years in prison on charges of “assembly and collusion against national security,” “membership in the Defenders of Human Rights Center,” and “propaganda against the state.” The sentence was reduced to six years in prison upon appeal. In June 2013 she was released from Zanjan Prison in northwest Iran on six billion rials (approximately $200,000 USD) bail because of severe neurological problems.