Journalist gets four-month suspended jail sentence

Reporters Without Borders (Reporters sans frontières - RSF) protested today against the sentencing of Hojat Heydari to a four-month suspended prison sentence and a six-month ban on working as a journalist and expressed concern about legal action against two other journalists. "We demand cancellation of the sentence hanging over Heydari like a sword of Damocles," said RSF secretary-general Robert Ménard in a letter to Iran's highest legal authority, Ayatollah Sharudi. He added that "the failure of the UN Human Rights Commission to condemn Iran at its recent meeting has given the Iranian authorities a sense of security that is encouraging attacks on press freedom." RSF noted that Heydari is the third journalist to receive a jail sentence in Iran over the past month and that Iran retains the dubious record for the most journalists (12) in prison in the region. RSF learns that on 1 May 2002 the court in the holy city of Qom sentenced Heydari, who works on the weekly Payam-e-Qom, after finding him guilty of insulting the tenets of "the Islamic Revolution" and putting out "false news." The court suspended his four-month jail sentence and six-month work ban for two years, meaning that he must avoid further such convictions during that time. The court said his articles, which reported on corruption in Qom, were aimed at encouraging "corruption and immorality" in the city when in fact its citizens were "fervent believers well-known for their devotion to religious principles." Heydari has appealed against the verdict. Two other journalists, Banafsheh Samgis, of the government daily Iran, and Mohsen Sharnazdar, editor of the paper's music supplement, appeared before a court on 1 May after the publication of a review of a book by the writer Tuka Maleki about Iranian women musicians, which says the Prophet Mohammed used to enjoyed listening to music sung and played by women. The review scandalised the Iranian clergy. Samgis has been summoned to appear before the court again on 5 May. In addition, several mullahs in Qom called on 29 April for the "judgement of God" to be applied to the managing editor of Iran, Abdollah Nasseri Taheri, which is understood to mean the death penalty. A court in Teheran sentenced Ahmed Zeid-Abadi, of the pro-reform weekly Hamchahri, to 23 months in prison and a five-year ban on all public activity on 17 April for alleged anti-Islamic propaganda. A day earlier, Ali-Hamed Iman, editor of the regional weekly Chams-e-Tabriz, was sentenced eight months in prison and 74 lashes.