Renowned journalist Mohammad Reza Yazdanpanah was sent to a detention center in 2009 as part of the crackdown on reformist media. While in detention, he was threatened with rape, humiliated on a daily basis and kept in solitary confinement. After he was released, he fled to the Czech Republic.
Name: Mohammad Reza Yazdanpanah
Career: Reporter; editor of Aftab political website, political correspondent for newspapers Ham Mihan, Farhikhtegan, Yas-e Now, Kargozaran, Sedaaye Edaalat; assistant to the New York Times correspondent in Tehran; editor-in-chief of Green Movement website.
Charges: Activities against national security, propaganda against the regime, misleading the public by suggesting that the 2009 presidential elections were fraudulent, cooperation with hostile powers by giving interviews to foreign media, spying through contacts with foreign embassies in Tehran, insulting a Shia saint and the Supreme Leader and participating in illegal protests.
Mohammad Reza Yazdanpanah worked with various reformist media when he was arrested on July 8, 2009 after the disputed presidential election in Iran.
He was detained for 17 days at an unknown location. He was kept in solitary confinement and not allowed to communicate with the outside world. News sites, which were following the stories of people detained after the election, reported on the harsh treatment that Yazdanpanah had to endure in prison. He was threatened with rape and continuously humiliated, including one incident where he was forced to stand on his feet for 48 hours without water or food.
Like many other journalists, he was forced to emigrate. For several years he worked with the website Rooz Online and wrote about jailed prisoners. He is now a correspondent for the American-sponsored Radio Farda and lives in Prague in the Czech Republic.
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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