Iranian security forces arrested Iranian student journalist Mohammad Javad Shaker Arani on September 26, 2022.
Shaker, a master’s student in physics at Sharif University of Technology in Tehran covers culture and politics for the university’s semi-independent newspaper and accompanying news website, Sharif University Newspaper. He is also an editor there.
Shaker covered protests following the death of a 22-year-old woman, Mahsa Amini, after morality police arrested her for allegedly violating the country’s conservative dress law. CPJ reviewed his coverage before the student newspaper’s website was taken down.
Shaker was arrested after being summoned to the judiciary’s investigation office along with several other university students, his lawyer Mohammad-Ali Kamfirouzi said in a tweet on September 26. Sharif University issued a statement confirming the arrests. The journalist is in Evin Prison in Tehran.
CPJ was unable to determine what, if any charges the journalist faces nor the status of his health in prison.
Authorities arrested dozens of journalists as the protests over Amini’s death spread across the country. Several of them were later released on bail.
CPJ emailed Iran’s mission to the United Nations in late 2022 for comment on the cases of imprisoned Iranian journalists but received no response.