Reza Taleshian Jelodarzadeh, editor-in-chief of Tehran-based Nour-e Azadi magazine, was taken into custody on January 20 to serve a three-year prison sentence for “disturbing public opinion” and “spreading anti-establishment propaganda,” the Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) reported on Friday.
“Iranian authorities must free Reza Taleshian Jelodarzadeh immediately and unconditionally,” said CPJ’s Middle East and North Africa Program Coordinator Sherif Mansour. “Iran’s continued jailing of journalists on vague charges is an outrageous form of censorship that must end.”
CPJ also expressed concern about the case of Mahmoud Mahmoudi, editor of the Kurdish-focused Aigrin Roj Weekly, arrested in Sanandaj in late January. He was taken to an unknown location and is facing unknown charges, according to the human rights network HRANA.
Mahmoudi was one of about 50 signatories of a letter published in Akhbar Rooz, protesting a recent wave of arrests of activists in Iran’s Kurdish areas.
This week, a group of 37 civil society and human rights organizations, including Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch, called for “the urgent attention of the international community” to the crackdown.
“To date, the Iranian authorities have failed to provide any information about the reasons for the arrests, but according to credible information gathered from informed sources, there are serious concerns that the arrests are due to the individuals’ peaceful exercise of their rights to freedom of opinion, expression and association, including through involvement in peaceful civil society activism and/or perceived support for the political visions espoused by Kurdish opposition parties seeking respect for the human rights of Iran’s Kurdish minority,” the joint letter stated.
