Saturday 27 June 2009

RWB: 'Break silence on prisoners in Iran'

Chilling posting on Reporters Wthout Borders website on Evin jail in Iran.
"Nothing and no-one comes out of Iran’s prisons. Iranians line up at the gates of the prison, looking for a name, searching for relatives of whom they have had no news. The same desperate search is replicated in all the cities of the country. The list of 700 names posted at the entrance to Evin jail is incomplete. Families are systematically refused the right to see their disappeared loves ones. The doors stay closed. Some 150 Iranian lawyers on 22 June appealed to the authorities for the release of those arrested and calling at least for the right of access to the prison for their lawyers.
"The relatives of arrested journalists are pushed from pillar to post by the different administrations. 'No, he is not here. Go there.' And once they get to the place indicated they get sent back to where they started from.
“The families of hundreds of Iranians imprisoned in Evin jail have the right to see their loved ones and to get information about the reasons for their detention. Those held in Section 209 are particularly at risk. We urge the Tehran authorities to allow representatives of the foreign press and of human rights organisations to visit the prison, as was allowed in 2006”, Reporters Without Borders said.
“Several witness accounts makes us fear that torture and ill-treatment are being systematically inflicted on prisoners who have demonstrated against the regime. Several journalists and bloggers were brutally treated by the guards and by men employed by the state prosecutor Saaed Mortazavi..
“Like Chile’s Santiago football stadium in 1973, Evin prison has become a bloody detention centre where arbitrary treatment is meted out. We urge the international community to do its utmost to break the silence surrounding prisoners of opinion in Evin prison."

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