Several Arrested in Sistan and Baluchestan on Charges of Contact with Foreign Media

Ibrahim Hamidi, the head of the judiciary of Sistan and Baluchestan province, last month, without referring to any specific person, accused the detainee of “inciting people and preparing documents for foreign media.”

Gholamqadir Bozorgzadeh, Abdullah’s father, held a sit-in on July 5 in front of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps in Iranshahr and demanded information about his son’s condition.

Following this sit-in, the Campaign for Human Rights in Iran reported, citing an informed source, that Abdullah Bozorgzadeh “after 20 days of no news… called his mother briefly at one in the morning and said in a trembling voice that he was fine but did not say where he was.”

Summons of 10 Telegram Channel Administrators in Isfahan

On Monday, Pirooz Darfshan, a lawyer, also reported the summoning of a number of Telegram channel administrators to the Isfahan judicial complex.

According to Mr. Darfshan, these individuals had previously registered their Telegram channels with the Ministry of Culture and Islamic Guidance, and after Telegram was filtered, they were informed that activity on this messenger application “is a crime and you will be dealt with.”

He, who represents one of these individuals as a lawyer, stated that they were subsequently summoned to the Isfahan judicial complex.

According to this lawyer, most of these individuals are women who “manage channels about confectionery, cake baking or topics related to art and women.”

Gholamhossein Mohseni Eje’i, the first deputy and spokesman of Iran’s judiciary, on Saturday, June 1, called for Iranian citizens to leave Telegram and said that continued use of this messenger application could “result in a crime.”

Abdolsamad Khorramabadi, the deputy prosecutor general of the country, also stated on Saturday, May 19, that due to Telegram being filtered, “advertising and service activities” of guilds on this messenger “are prohibited” and the Ministry of Industry and guild organizations should address this measure.

The Tehran Media and Culture Prosecutor’s Office issued an order to filter Telegram on May 20.

However, one month after this action, Mohammad Javad Zarif, Minister of Communications and Information Technology, reported “resistance” by Iranian users to the judicial order blocking Telegram and announced that after Telegram was filtered, only one million people had left it.

International organizations have consistently described Iran in recent years as one of the “main enemies” of the internet and cyberspace. For instance, Reporters Without Borders in its reports describes the Iranian government, along with a few other governments, as an “enemy of the internet,” and the “Freedom House” organization in one of its latest reports has placed the Islamic Republic in the fourth place at the bottom of the “internet freedom” index.