Iran

Iranian authorities announced on Tuesday that two German reporters for Bild am Sonntag will be charged with espionage, according to international news reports. They were arrested in October while interviewing the son of a woman sentenced to death by stoning on charges of adultery. The Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) has expressed alarm at these developments and called on Iranian authorities...

The Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) has called on Iranian authorities to immediately disclose the names of two Germans who were arrested on Sunday and described as journalists in several news reports. CPJ also asked Iranian officials to clarify the circumstances surrounding the arrests of the two individuals and to state what, if any, charges were filed against them. The head of the German...

Iran has decided to expel Tehran-based journalist Ángeles Espinosa, the correspondent of the Spanish daily El País. The authorities cancelled her residence permit on October 10 and gave her two weeks to leave Iran, where she has been an accredited journalist for the past five years. No explanation was given. Espinosa’s press card was withdrawn when she was arrested in Qom in July after...

The Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) has expressed alarm at Iran's continued persecution of independent journalists. Reporters Shiva Nazar Ahari and Emadeddin Baghi have each been sentenced to six years in prison, while authorities are said to be considering the death penalty for blogger Hossein Derakhshan, according to news reports. On Saturday, Iranian authorities sentenced Nazar Ahari, a...

Iranian free speech defender Nasrin Sotoudeh, a lawyer who has represented many imprisoned journalists, has now herself been arrested. She was arrested on September 5 on charges of anti-government propaganda and conspiring against the regime after responding to a summons from a revolutionary court prosecutor's office located inside Tehran's Evin prison. “Nasrin Sotoudeh has for the past year been...

A hardline Iranian newspaper has called the French first lady a "prostitute" and recommended she be put to death for supporting a woman sentenced to death by stoning in Iran for adultery. Under the headline "French prostitutes enter the human rights uproar," the Kayhan daily newspaper referred Saturday to Carla Bruni-Sarkozy as a "prostitute" after she released an open letter in support of Sakineh...

An imprisoned Iranian journalist is suing Nokia Siemens Networks (NSN) over allegations that the telecommunications company provided the Islamic regime with a monitoring system it used to spy on the opposition Green movement, according to the Guardian. Isa Saharkhiz, a prominent journalist and political figure, was arrested after last summer's disputed presidential election. Saharkhiz, who is...

Iranian authorities have imposed a six-year prison sentence against journalist Badressadat Mofidi, according to New York-based press freedom group Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ). Mofidi was formerly the secretary-general of the Association of Iranian Journalists in Tehran, an organisation that was established by prominent journalists in 1997 and shut down by the authorities in 2009. On...

The Iranian state committee that monitors the press has banned the well-known economic newspaper Asia, RFE/RL's Radio Farda reports. The Deputy Head of Iran's Ministry of Culture and Islamic Guidance, Mohammad Ali Ramin, said the reasons for closing down "Asia" include "publishing pictures against public chastity,” “promoting wastefulness and extravagance," and "persistence in carrying out the...

Iran's deputy culture minister lashed out at Western media on Sunday, branding them "dishonest, cocky cheats," who will be banned from an annual press fair in the autumn, the ILNA news agency reported. "This year none of the Western media are allowed to participate in the fair," said Mohammad Ali Ramin, who is also a press watchdog official. "We have eliminated them, because Western media are...