A year after the death of Zahra Kazemi, Reporters Without Borders fears impunity will prevail

Reporters Without Borders said today it fears that impunity will prevail in the case of Zahra Kazemi, a photo-journalist with Canadian and Iranian nationality who died a year ago (on 10 July 2003) in Baghiatollah hospital in Tehran after being beaten while in detention. "We suspect that the senior Iranian officials implicated in this murder will remain unpunished and that a scape-goat will be convicted in order to put an end to a case that is embarrassing for the regime," the organisation said. "We nonetheless hope that the trial due to take place on 17 July will shed full light on this killing and that our Canadian section, which is still awaiting visas, will be able to attend as observers," Reporters Without Borders said. The organisation called on the Iranian authorities to allow Kazemi's lawyers to participate in preparing the case for the trial as required by Iran's constitution and international norms, and it reiterated its call for the repatriation of her remains to Canada, as requested by her son, for an independent autopsy. Aged 54 and normally resident in Canada, Kazemi was detained outside Evin prison, north of Tehran, on 23 June 2003 as she was taking photos of the relatives of detainees. Beaten while in detention, she died from her injuries just over two weeks later. After initially trying to cover up the cause of her death, the Iranian authorities recognised on 16 July 2003 that she was "beaten." Kazemi's body was hastily buried in the southern town of Chiraz on 22 July 2003, contrary to the wishes of her son, Stephan Hachemi, a permanent resident in Canada who has French and Canadian citizenship. Kazemi's mother in Iran publicly acknowledged that she was pressured into authorising her burial in Iran. Since then, the authorities have paid no heed to the requests for her remains to be disinterred and repatriated to Canada. A commission of enquiry to determine the circumstances of her death was set up at President Khatami's request on 13 July 2003. In a report released a week later, the commission said that between the time of her arrest on 23 June and her transfer to hospital on 27 June, Kazemi was interrogated in turn by the staff of Tehran state prosecutor Said Mortazavi, the police, the prosecutor's staff again, and finally by officials with the intelligence ministry. The report said the skull fracture that caused her death occurred no more than 36 hours before her hospitalisation at midnight on 27 June. According to the chronology of events established by the investigation, the fatal injury could have occurred while she was in the custody of the prosecutor's staff or the intelligence ministry. The report also said that doctors in Baghiatollah hospital determined that Kazemi was "brain dead" as early as 27 June, the day that her family was told that she was in a coma in hospital. The report did not explain why the doctors waited until 10 July, the day after the anniversary of the July 1999 student demonstrations, to officially announce her death. The military prosecutor's office assigned Kazemi's case on 23 July 2003 to Mortazavi, but Mortazavi subsequently recused himself because of the allegations that he was directly involved in her death. The commission of enquiry had established that he personally took part in an interrogation session within hours of her arrest. The case was transferred to Judge Esmaili at the end of July 2003. After a wrangle between reformist and conservative clans, which blamed each other for Kazemi's death, an Iranian intelligence agent, Mohammad Reza Aghdam Ahmadi, was named on 22 September 2003 as the suspected killer. Judicial service chief Mahmoud Hashemi Shahroudi and intelligence minister Ali Younessi set up a committee at the end of December 2003 with the ostensible aim of reviewing all of the facts of the Kazemi case. The real aim, however, was to find a compromise. Shahroudi said at the time: "The important thing is not who killed Zahra Kazemi. Whether an agent with the intelligence ministry or a member of the Tehran prosecutor's staff, it doesn't matter. What counts is to name a suspect." The Iranian judicial authorities rule out any question of state institutions being to blame and accuse Ahmadi of "almost deliberate" murder. This is the point on which the Kazemi family lawyer, Nobel peace laureate Shirin Ebadi, intends to base her case in order to establish that the blow or blows were inflicted on Kazemi with the intention of killing her. Another lawyer, Mohamad Ali Dadakhah, maintains that the court has no jurisdiction and that the case should be dealt with by an assize court. Dadakhah also reported that a second person has been charged in the case. It is Mohammad Bakhshi, an official at Evin prison. On its official website, www.rouydad.info, the Participation Front (President Khatami's party) had already claimed that Bakhshi took part in Kazemi's killing as an assistant to the Tehran prosecutor, Mortazavi.