Ehsan Mazandarani, Imprisoned Journalist, Threatens Hunger Strike

Ehsan Mazandarani, an imprisoned journalist, has threatened to begin a hunger strike starting Wednesday, October 1, demanding the formation of a 'fact-finding committee' regarding the reasons for his detention and that of other journalists in November of last year. In a letter from prison published on social media, he announced that he would go on hunger strike in protest against 'lawlessness and arbitrariness' in the process of his arrest and trial until his four demands are met. He warned that if his demands are not met, he would continue the hunger strike even to the point of death. The four demands he outlined include the formation of a 'fact-finding committee' regarding his detention and that of four other journalists, legal action against the 'deceptive elements' of the Supreme Leader regarding the project known as 'infiltration', his release from prison considering that one-third of his sentence has been served, and his appearance on state television to defend himself against the accusations made against him. Mazandarani emphasized that the 'fake project' of arresting an infiltration network was designed to deceive the Supreme Leader and to undermine the government of Hassan Rouhani. He reported that he had written a letter to the Supreme Leader detailing the events that occurred during his detention, which was delivered to Ayatollah Khamenei by Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani, the head of the Expediency Discernment Council, in April 2016. Ehsan Mazandarani, Eisa Saharkhiz, Saman Safarzadeh, and Afrin Chitsaz were arrested on November 11, 2015. Davood Asadi, the brother of journalist Houshang Asadi, was also detained alongside these journalists. The IRGC has accused these journalists of being 'members of a Western infiltration network', but Ali Shamkhani, the Secretary of the Supreme National Security Council of Iran, and Ali Motahari, a representative from Tehran, have confirmed that the aim of these arrests was 'political retribution'. Ehsan Mazandarani was initially sentenced to seven years in prison, which was reduced to two years on appeal. Mahmoud Alizadeh Tabatabai, the lawyer for Eisa Saharkhiz and Ehsan Mazandarani, reported on February 1, 2016, that despite the opposing opinion of the case investigator, the prosecutor and the head of Branch 15 of the Revolutionary Court of Tehran charged these two imprisoned journalists with heavier crimes such as 'acting against national security through assembly and collusion' and 'insulting officials'. Meanwhile, Ehsan Mazandarani wrote in his letter that the case investigator was 'dismissed and transferred to another branch' due to attempts to issue a dismissal order and secure his release. Ehsan Mazandarani was also arrested in 2012 along with several other journalists and was released after 18 days. In his letter, he wrote that in that year, interrogators had asked him to falsely confess that he, along with Mehdi Hashemi, the son of Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani, was involved in 'fabricating cases or making films against the children of one of the high-ranking officials of the regime'. Mazandarani's reference to 'the children of one of the high-ranking officials of the regime' could be related to Mojtaba Khamenei. Previously, conservative media had accused Mehdi Hashemi of disseminating news against the Supreme Leader. While the four journalists arrested in November of last year remain imprisoned, several other journalists have also been detained in recent days. Sadra Mohaghegh, the social service editor of Shargh newspaper, was arrested at his home on Monday, September 20. Yashar Soltani, the editor-in-chief of the 'Memari News' website, was also summoned due to reports about the transfer of Tehran municipality properties and was arrested on Saturday, September 25, after failing to provide a 200 million tomans bail.