Iran releases on bail the two journalists imprisoned for reporting on the death of Mahsa Amini

This Sunday, Iran released on bail the journalists Nilufar Hamedi and Elahe Mohammadi, who had been imprisoned for more than 15 months for having reported on the death of Mahsa Yina Amini. The death of that 22-year-old Kurdish girl in police custody on September 16, 2022, after being arrested accused of wearing the veil incorrectly, triggered the largest wave of protests against the Iranian regime since the establishment of the Islamic Republic in 1979. .

The two journalists had been sentenced in October in the first instance to various prison sentences totaling 13 and 12 years in prison—although the actual sentence was seven and six years—respectively. Both were arrested in September 2022, shortly after reporting Amini's death, and have spent all this time in Evin prison in Tehran, most of it in isolation. Hamedi and Mohammadi have emerged hand in hand from that prison, known for housing political prisoners, making the victory sign and without the veil, which is still mandatory in Iran. Family and friends were waiting for them outside with bouquets of flowers, according to videos posted on social networks.

Mohammadi's twin sister, Elnaz, was the one who reported on the social network convicted in the first instance—among them of conspiring against national security and collaborating with the United States. Hamedi and Mohammadi have regained their freedom after paying the equivalent of 178,000 euros, according to the Efe agency, which has in turn reported, citing the Fars agency, that the two women are prohibited from leaving the country. That figure is astronomical in a country whose average salary is around the equivalent of 400 euros per month.

Until her arrest on September 22, 2022, Nilufar Hamedi, 31, worked at the semi-reformist newspaper Shargh Daily, while Mohammadi, 36, arrested seven days later, reported on the website, also moderately critical Ham-Miham.

Hamedi was the first journalist to approach the Kasra hospital in Tehran to inquire about the situation of a young woman who had been left in a coma, according to several testimonies, after receiving a beating from the moral police, who had detained her at the exit of the hospital. Tehran metro with the accusation of wearing the hijab incorrectly. It was September 16, 2022 and that young woman, Mahsa Yina Amini, had just been declared dead by doctors, after spending three days in a coma. Hamedi took a photograph of the young woman's parents hugging and crying inconsolably in a hallway at the center. She then spread it on her social networks. That image soon went viral and sparked protests against the Iranian regime that broke out at the funeral of the young Amini in Saqqez, in her native Kurdistan, in the west of the country, the day after her death. her.

The other journalist now released on bail, Mohammadi, covered that funeral in which many women took off their veils and began shouting the phrase that became the symbol of the protests against the Islamic Republic: “Woman, life and freedom.” The repression that followed later killed at least 500 people. More than 22,000 were arrested and at least eight men were executed in connection with the protests, one of them in public, according to Iranian human rights organizations in exile.

After being arrested, Hamedi and Mohammadi were accused of “cooperation with the hostile US government, collusion against national security and propaganda against the regime,” according to the newspaper. ShargDaily. The two journalists were sentenced by Chamber 15 of the Revolutionary Court of Tehran. The revolutionary courts were created with the purpose of trying opponents of the regime and maintain a close link with the intelligence of the Revolutionary Guard, the parallel army to the regular one founded in turn with the objective of defending the Islamic republic. Chamber or section 15 of that court also has a disastrous history of death sentences, especially until 2019, while it was presided over by the one known as “the hanging judge”, Abdolqasem Salavati.

On October 28, 2022, a joint statement from the Iranian Intelligence Ministry and Revolutionary Guard intelligence described both journalists, identified by their initials, as collaborators with the US CIA and the Israeli Mossad, in particular Hamedi. Without providing evidence, the statement stated: “Using the cover of a journalist, [Hamedi] He was one of the first people to arrive at the hospital and provoked the relatives of the deceased. [Mahsa Amini] to publish news for a predetermined purpose.”

Regarding Mohammadi, the statement stated that he “instantly attended the funeral ceremony of Mahsa Amini in his hometown, Saqqez, to provoke his relatives by circulating the news and images of that funeral and burial.” The text maintained that this reporter “had been trained by the North American mafia regime in foreign countries.” Both Hamedi and Mohammadi, the statement maintained, “were a source of information for the foreign press.”

Both professional organizations such as the Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ), based in New York, and human rights organizations such as Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch (HRW), considered the imprisonment of the women “arbitrary.” two informants and accused the Iranian regime of constantly “harassing, persecuting and punishing” journalists and those who “exercise their right to freedom of expression,” HRW accused. In the 15 months they have spent in prison, Hamedi and Mohammadi have been awarded various international awards, including the Golden Pen of Freedom 2023, the annual recognition of press freedom granted by the World Association of News Publishers.

According to CPJ data, Iran has detained at least 95 other journalists since the outbreak of anti-regime protests sparked by the death of Mahsa Amini. Like Hamedi and Mohammadi, many of these informants have been released on bail without the charges against them being dropped, including in several cases the ban on practicing their profession and reporting even through their social networks.

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