Ahmadpour, a journalist, blogger, and researcher at Qom Seminary, was serving a three-year prison term on anti-state charges stemming from a letter he wrote to U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon, according to reformist news websites. In the letter, written in 2010 while he was serving an earlier prison term, Ahmadpour protested abuses of his rights. The Qom Special Clerics Court also imposed 10 years of exile, defrocking, and deprivation of any clerical position, according to the same reports.
Ahmadpour was a student of Ayatollah Hossein-Ali Montazeri, the now-deceased cleric who had criticized then-President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad’s positions. He was arrested in December 2009 and sentenced to a year in prison on charges of “acting against national security” and “violating the dignity of the clergy” in his writings, reformist news websites said.
A disabled Iran-Iraq War veteran, Ahmadpour suffers from respiratory problems due to exposure to chemical warfare. His respiratory condition worsened and he suffered cardiac problems due to harsh prison conditions and lack of medical care, according to reformist news websites. Ahmadpour was being held at Khorram Abad’s Parsilon Prison, which is used to confine hardened criminals, according to news reports. Ahmadpour was released from prison on June 24, 2013, and was exiled to the southern town of Izeh for 10 years, according to news reports.
Ahmadpour has resumed writing in his blog, Pejvak-e Khamoosh (The Silent Echo). His 10-year exile was later reduced to two years, according to news reports.