Sunday, 19 April 2009

Iranian Justice, Trial and Sentence First, Defence Afterwards

In a case that's eerily reminiscent of the arrest, torture and eventual murder, of the half Canadian journalist Zahra Kazemi, by the Iranian police

Roxana Saberi ... In An Un-Iranian Pose
Roxana Saberi ... In An Un-Iranian Pose.

...... another "Journalist", half American Roxana Saberi  has been arrested and then given a one day "secret trial", and then sentenced to eight years for "Spying".

Oddly, only after the trial and conviction, did anyone in Iran suggest that she might have any form of legal defence afforded to her, when Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, sent a letter from his office to Tehran's prosecutor, which suggested she must have her legal right to defend herself if she appeals.

The mother of the Ms Saberi, has said that her daughters health is "fragile", which may be a coded suggestion that physical or psychological torture had been used, and which may also explain why the trial was held in secret. She was released on May 11, 2009 after intervention by US President Obama. An Iranian appeals court took the hint from its own President Ahmadinejad, and reduced the charges against her, from espionage, to possessing classified information. She denied this charge as well, and the court reduced her eight-year prison term to a two-year suspended sentence .... a lucky escape.
 
Roxana Saberi Was Miss North Dakota In 1997
Roxana Saberi ... Miss North Dakota 1997

But it appears that there is a certain naivety, in these "Iranian" women 'journalists,' who hold North American passports, and who appear to believe to that this makes them safe from the attentions of the Iranian Revolutionary Guards, sadly this is a very misplaced belief. The long list of hostages held by Iran proves that ....

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