Freelance journalist Mahboubeh Khansari was arrested in 2010 as part of the clampdown on journalists that followed the disputed 2009 election. Khansari was targeted for her reporting on social and urban affairs.
Name: Mahboubeh Khansari
Born: 1980
Career: Newspaper and magazine journalist who has written for Sarmayeh, Kargozaran, Miras-e Farhangi, as well as for publications specializing in social and urban affairs.
Charges: Activities against national security and propaganda against the regime.
Mahboubeh Khansari began her career as a freelance journalist specializing in urban and social affairs. Though she did not consider herself to be a political journalist, she was arrested in the aftermath of the 2009 presidential election, along with other journalists.
On May 31, 2010, five Intelligence Ministry agents arrested Khansari at her home at 11pm. At the time of her arrest, she had been working as a journalist for less than a year, primarily focusing on research and completing her dissertation on news translation.
The agents—four men and one woman—confiscated Khansari’s mobile phone, computer and other personal items before escorting her out of the building. The agents refused to answer any questions about why Khansari was being arrested or where she was being taken, and informed her family that they would be contacted after a period of 48 hours. They were told they could pursue the matter with the Revolutionary Prosecutor’s office.
Khansari was placed in solitary confinement at Evin Prison’s Cell Block 209, where she was informed of the charges against her. She was initially charged with “activities against national security” but was later told she had been accused of “propaganda against the regime” because of her media activities. Emails, online comments and articles Khansari had contributed to online publications were all used as evidence against her.
Mahboubeh Khansari was released on 28 June 2010. She served her entire sentence in solitary confinement. The charge of propaganda against the regime was transferred to Branch 26 of the Revolutionary Court, which handed down a one-year mandatory prison sentence and a five-year suspended sentence.
Khansari is currently studying at Paris’s Sorbonne University and writes on social issues for a number of websites.
This is part of IranWire’s series Crime: Journalism, a portfolio on the legal and political persecution of Iranian journalists and bloggers, published in both Persian and English.
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