Masih Alinejad: Islamic Republic Intends to Pressure Foreign Journalists by Taking Family Members Hostage
Masih Alinejad says the Islamic Republic is attempting to pressure her by imprisoning her brother in Iran because of her journalistic activities.
Masih Alinejad, an independent journalist and host of the Tablet program at Voice of America, said on Monday, November 9, 2020, in an interview with the Voice of America’s Persian service news program “9 Shab” that the Islamic Republic regime “from the very beginning empowered itself by taking American diplomats hostage, became arrogant, then took dual nationals hostage, and now is taking family members of political prisoners and human rights activists hostage to silence me. What I want to say is that this government that executes and tortures should have a guilty conscience, not me, who am merely the voice of these families and the voice of these victims.”
She stated that a petition released by Said Dehgan and Arash Keyhsaravi, two lawyers of her brother, is their document and testimony stating that “the Islamic Republic and the judiciary have taken Masih Alinejad’s brother hostage.” Ms. Alinejad added: “In this petition, these two lawyers have declared that what was heard in the primary court was the shouting of Judge Ghassem, and the weak voice of Ali Alinejad was not heard in court.”
According to Ms. Alinejad, the aforementioned two lawyers wrote and testified that “because Masih Alinejad did not back down from her work, the appeals court and court of cassation confirmed the sentence of eight years imprisonment for my brother. [But] I will not back down and I will not be silent.”
Four months ago, the eight-year prison sentence for Alireza Alinejad, the brother of Masih Alinejad, an independent journalist and host of the Tablet program at Voice of America, which was issued in late July by the Tehran Islamic Revolutionary Court, was also confirmed identically by the appeals court.
Said Dehgan, the defense lawyer of Alireza Alinejad, announced on Sunday, October 18, on Twitter that Branch 36 of the Tehran Province Appeals Court, without considering the objections of Mr. Alinejad’s defense lawyers to the issuance of the eight-year prison sentence by Branch 28 of the Tehran Islamic Revolutionary Court, confirmed this sentence identically.
Mr. Dehgan further announced that he intends to, along with Arash Keyhsaravi, another defense lawyer of Mr. Alinejad, publish their defense briefs in this case soon.
Ms. Alinejad had previously announced on Twitter, coinciding with the issuance of the eight-year prison sentence by the revolutionary court for her brother, that two years of this conviction is for insulting the supreme leader and because of a statement by Mr. Alinejad in which he said that whenever Khamenei disassociated himself from his state media, he would also disown his sister.
On the other hand, this independent journalist, who says the Islamic Republic has taken her brother hostage to “silence and punish” her, had previously said in an interview with Voice of America: “The IRGC had a plan with my sister’s family to lure me to Turkey under the pretext of visiting my mother and kidnap me there. My brother exposed their plan and openly wrote to me on Instagram: Don’t come to Turkey. Now they have sentenced my brother for exposing the IRGC’s conspiracy.”
Based on available information, Iranian Ministry of Intelligence officers arrested Ali Alinejad on Tuesday, August 24 of last year, by “raiding” his home.
This is not the first time that family members of this independent journalist and founder of the “White Wednesday” campaign against mandatory hijab have been pressured by Islamic Republic authorities. In late March of last year, Ms. Alinejad told Voice of America that her mother was summoned by security police and warned that she must answer for “phone communications with outside the country.”
Source: Voice of America
