Kaveh Madani Responds to Accusation of Fleeing the Country: I Was Myself, but Not One of Them

Hours after Tehran's prosecutor accused Kaveh Madani of 'fleeing' the country, Madani, who left after resigning from the Environmental Protection Organization, tweeted: 'I was myself, but I was not one of them.' From the former deputy of Iran's Environmental Organization's tweet, it appears that he was pressured to leave the country because he was not part of the 'insiders' close to the power circle in the Islamic Republic. Madani states in his tweet that he does not consider himself 'needing to negotiate to conceal dark and specific backgrounds' and returned to Iran only out of 'love for the homeland and hope for improvement.' At 37, he was invited to work in the Environmental Protection Organization during Hassan Rouhani's second term. He had previously mentioned that his friends and family opposed his desire to accept an official position in the Islamic Republic, deeming it 'madness,' yet he came to Iran and worked as the deputy of the Environmental Organization. Following the accusation of 'espionage' against several environmental activists in Iran and the arrest of some, including Kavous Seyed-Emami, news of Kaveh Madani's arrest also surfaced. Although this news was not officially confirmed, reports indicated that Madani, a day after his arrest, attended his office with several agents to remove some documents and materials for submission to security authorities. Two days ago, it was reported that Kaveh Madani and his wife left the country after being lifted from a travel ban and do not intend to return to Iran. In response to this news, Tehran's prosecutor accused Madani on Wednesday, April 29, of preferring 'flight over commitment.' The Fars news agency, close to the IRGC, quoted prosecutor Abbas Jafari Dolatabadi as saying, 'If today we read on some websites that this gentleman has left the country, it relates to the progress of investigations.' Dolatabadi again accused the detained environmental activists, who have been in custody for over two months, of espionage: 'These individuals were covers for the exit of information from the country, and in the statements of one of the accused, it was mentioned that they had also done this abroad and had entered the country trained to carry out similar actions in foreign domains.' The Tehran prosecutor also described Kavous Seyed-Emami as 'the main accused in the case' and further threatened Kaveh Madani, saying, 'If someone has left the country, they will eventually return, and as the saying goes, there is a time for everything, but no fire without smoke.' Several environmental activists, including Kavous Seyed-Emami, a university professor and Iranian-Canadian citizen, were arrested in early February of last year. Seyed-Emami lost his life in prison two weeks after his arrest. The Iranian judiciary claims that Seyed-Emami was a spy for the CIA and Mossad and committed suicide in prison. However, his family has denied this account and filed complaints with the responsible authorities. The Canadian government has also demanded explanations from the Iranian government regarding the death of one of its dual citizens. On Tuesday, Kaveh Madani also tweeted in response to the accusation of 'fleeing' the country: 'Yes, #accused_fled from a land where #virtual_fools rejected science, knowledge, and expertise and were in search of a convict to shoulder all problems because they realized that finding a #culprit and #enemy and #spy is much easier than #responsibility and #participation in solving problems.'