Judge Rejects Bail Request for Afrin Nissari

The Tehran Revolutionary Court rejected a massive bail of fifty billion tomans submitted for the release of Ms. Afrin Nissari, the wife of Mr. Karan Vafadari, a Zoroastrian citizen with dual Iranian-American nationality who is imprisoned. This comes despite the fact that the same judge had previously requested this amount of bail. The Iran Human Rights Campaign reported on Saturday, February 3, that Judge Abolghasem Salavati, head of Branch 15 of the Tehran Revolutionary Court, stated when half of the one hundred billion tomans bail was presented by the lawyers, "If I wanted them to be released, I wouldn't have set such a heavy bail." Judge Salavati had previously requested fifty billion tomans for the release of each of the couple, totaling one hundred billion tomans. According to the imprisoned couple's family, posting half of such a heavy bail was very difficult for them, but they eventually managed to provide property documents equivalent to fifty billion tomans, hoping for the release of Ms. Afrin Nissari, and submitted them through their lawyers to the court. Mr. Karan Vafadari and his wife Ms. Afrin Nissari have been in prison for a year and a half, but news of their arrest was revealed last week, coinciding with the heavy sentence against them becoming public. Karan Vafadari returned to Iran after living in the West and opened an art gallery in Tehran, while his Muslim Iranian wife, who is an architecture graduate and has been collaborating with her husband in managing the gallery known as "An," holds a U.S. green card. The Tehran Revolutionary Court recently sentenced Mr. Karan to 27 years in prison and 124 lashes; Ms. Afrin Nissari was sentenced to sixteen years in prison. However, the couple was also ordered to pay large sums of money and have all their assets confiscated, including the art gallery and even the family's personal vehicles. "Acts against national security" and "disturbance of public order" are among the charges brought against this couple. The Tehran prosecutor also mentioned the "discovery of alcoholic beverages" and their interactions with foreign diplomats. Despite the fact that Revolutionary Courts have confiscated the assets of many Iranians over the 39 years of the Islamic Republic's existence, this appears to be the first time that asset confiscation has been explicitly added to the sentence of dual nationals returning to Iran. In addition to the unique feature of Mr. Vafadari and his wife's sentence regarding asset confiscation, according to the Iran Human Rights Campaign, Judge Salavati has also prevented the imprisoned couple from accessing lawyers appointed by the court itself in recent months. Zeynab Taheri, a lawyer, confirmed this behavior of Judge Salavati, stating that the judge wants to change the appointed lawyers and has said that individuals he deems "appropriate" should be the couple's appointed lawyers. Sirous Vafadari, one of Mr. Karan Vafadari's three children living in the U.S., told the Iran Human Rights Campaign that his father, aware of the rejection of the bail requested by Judge Salavati, simply remarked, "Such an event can only happen in Iran." The Islamic Republic of Iran has a long history of violating the fundamental rights of its non-Muslim citizens, according to dozens of reports from global human rights organizations, and recently, a growing number of them, especially those with citizenship in Western countries, have been imprisoned, tried, and convicted. Karan Vafadari, whose family has described his spirit in prison as depressed, wrote in a letter from prison last week, calling the sentences issued against him and his wife unjust, urging Zoroastrians living abroad to refrain from returning to Iran because "they may be arrested and tried without any reason, and their assets may also be confiscated."