Wednesday, June 24, 2009
Ali Mazroui of the Association of Iranian Journalists
At least 24 journalists and bloggers have been arrested in Iran since the contested presidential election on June 12, bringing the total to 33 locked up in prison, according to Reporters Without Borders. The media watchdog group, which calls Iran the world’s “biggest prison for journalists,” alongside China, says journalists are a “priority target” for the Tehran government as it seeks to control coverage of protests over the reelection of President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad amid allegations of electoral fraud.
While most of those arrested work for Iranian news or Internet operations, the round up has included Maziar Bahari, a correspondent for Newsweek, which has defended Bahari’s work as “fair and nuanced” and called for his release. Also, BBC correspondent Jon Leyne has been ordered to leave the country after being accused by Iranian officials of “dispatching fabricated news and reports, ignoring neutrality in news, supporting rioters and trampling the Iranian nation’s rights.”
Others arrested include Ali Mazroui, head of the Association of Iranian Journalists, Mohammad Ghochani, editor of Etemad-e Melli (a daily owned by Mehdi Karoubi, one of the opposition presidential candidates), and husband-and-wife journalists Bahaman Ahamadi Amoee and Jila Baniyaghoob. Baniyaghoob edits the women’s rights website, Canon Zeman Irani. Her husband, Amoee, writes for various pro-reform publications.
-Noel Brinkerhoff
At Least 24 Reporters Arrested in Iran (by Angela Charlton, Associated Press)
Repression Stepped Up Yet Again as Iran Becomes World’s Biggest Prison for Journalists (Reporters Without Borders)
Western Journalists Among Reporters Detained in Iran (by Tara Bahrampour, Washington Post)
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