Iran / Middle East & North Africa

Washington, D.C., February 5, 2020 — Iranian authorities should cease raiding journalists’ homes and should return all material confiscated in recent raids, the Committee to Protect Journalists said today.

Washington, D.C., February 3, 2020 – Iranian authorities should immediately drop the false news and defamation charges against the editors of three news outlets, the Committee to Protect Journalists said today.

Turkish intelligence agents arrested Arash Shoa-Shargh, an Iranian journalist living in exile in Turkey, on January 5, 2018, in Van, a city near Iran’s border, a friend of the journalist, who asked not to be named to protect their safety, told CPJ on December 16, 2019.

In October 2018, authorities arrested Pouyan Khoshhal as he drove through the northern Iranian city of Rasht, by the Caspian Sea. The reason for the journalist’s arrest: his use of the word “death” instead of “martyrdom” to describe a Shiite saint in an article for the reformist newspaper Ebtekar.

Washington, D.C., November 25, 2019 — Iranian authorities should immediately release journalist Mohammad Mosaed and drop any charges against him, the Committee to Protect Journalists said today.

Washington, D.C., November 20, 2019 — Iranian authorities should immediately restore internet access throughout the country and allow information to flow freely, the Committee to Protect Journalists said today.

In October 2019, the Tehran Appeals Court sentenced Pouria Alami, a political columnist and satirist with the reformist Shargh Daily, to one year in prison and Tahereh Riahi, the former social affairs editor of the government-funded Borna News Agency, to two and a half years in prison, according to news reports and a person close…

On October 14, 2019, intelligence agents of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps arrested journalist and activist Roohollah Zam, manager of Amad News, a popular anti-government news channel on the messaging app Telegram, according to a statement by the guard corps that was broadcast on state media.

Repressive governments use sophisticated digital censorship and surveillance alongside more traditional methods to silence independent media. A special report by the Committee to Protect Journalists. Published September 10, 2019 Eritrea is the world’s most censored country, according to a list compiled by the Committee to Protect Journalists. The list is based on CPJ’s research into the…

Washington, D.C., September 6, 2019 — Iranian authorities should release journalist Hossein Ghadyani from prison and stop jailing and harassing government critics, the Committee to Protect Journalists said today.