Iran: Farda Correspondent Talks About Her Sentence And Journalists' Dilemmas
Source: RFE/RL
Rdio Farda correspondent Parnaz Azima, who was stripped of her passport and
prevented from leaving Iran for eight months last year, has been convicted by an
Iranian revolutionary court of "spreading antistate propaganda" and sentenced to
one year in prison.
Azima, a former librarian and literary translator who holds both Iranian and
U.S. citizenship, is appealing the verdict, of which her Tehran lawyer was
informed on March 1. (More
on Azima and her case)
If the decision stands, the Prague-based journalist will face a stark choice:
return to Iran to serve out the sentence or forfeit the deed to her 95-year-old
mother's Tehran home, which was posted in lieu of bail.
In an interview with RFE/RL desk editor Jeffrey Donovan, Azima talks about
her dilemma but calls the situation for journalists in Iran more desperate than
her own. She also urges reporters outside her native land to speak up for the
rights of their fellow journalists in Iran.
Copyright (c) 2008 RFE/RL, Inc. Reprinted with the permission of Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, 1201 Connecticut Ave., N.W. Washington DC 20036. www.rferl.org