The head of the Environmental Protection Agency demanded that the case of environmental activists be determined.
The head of Iran's Environmental Protection Organization called for the release or determination of the fate of imprisoned environmental activists for the umpteenth time.
According to IRNA, Issa Kalantari said on Sunday, September 8, that these people should be given a place to live and that this is part of their citizenship rights.
In January of last year, Kavoos Seyed Emami, along with nine other environmental activists and experts, were arrested by the Revolutionary Guards. Shortly after, prison officials informed Mr. Seyed Emami's family that he had committed suicide in prison.
His death sparked widespread reactions in Canada and the United States, and some human rights organizations criticized the Islamic Republic.
The Islamic Republic's judiciary has charged the detainees with "espionage." The Islamic Republic's state-run Radio and Television (IRTV) claimed in a report that Mr. Seyed Emami, a university professor and director of the Persian Heritage Wildlife Foundation, and his colleagues used cheetah cameras to photograph IRGC missile sites and provided information about these sites to foreign intelligence agencies.
The head of the Environmental Protection Organization, however, denied this accusation and said that these cameras are only capable of recording images within a 50-meter radius around them.
Mr. Kalantari reiterated on Sunday that the Ministry of Intelligence believes that the detained environmental activists did not commit espionage. According to him, investigations by a four-member committee appointed by the president to follow up on the issue also show that there is no evidence that these individuals were involved in espionage.
Morteza Arianjad, Niloufar Bayani, Hooman Jokar, Amirhossein Khaleghi Hamidi, Hassan Ragh, Sam Rajabi, Aref Zare, Alireza Farhadzadeh, Taher Ghadirian, Abdolreza Koohpayeh, and Hamideh Kashani Doost are environmental activists and experts who have been arrested.
Mr. Kalantari said that the fate of these defendants was supposed to be determined by the end of the summer, while the date of their trial has not yet been announced.
Source: Voice of America
