Posted on 04/21/2009 4:59:38 PM PDT by nuconvert
Iran’s arrest of journalist Roxana Saberi recalls Iraq’s treatment of Farzad Bazoft.
Michael Rubin
On April 13, Roxana Saberi, a 31-year-old Iranian-American journalist, appeared before a closed hearing of a revolutionary court to answer charges of spying for the United States — potentially capital charges. Iranian officials brushed off Secretary of State Hillary Clinton’s request for Saberi to be released. Iranian justice was quick. On April 18, the court found Saberi guilty and sentenced her to eight years. Her case calls to mind that of Farzad Bazoft, a Western journalist executed by Saddam Hussein in 1990. It is worthwhile to reflect on the two cases, and to ask how the West might avoid repeating with Iran today the mistakes it made with Hussein almost two decades ago.
The charges against Saberi are spurious; she was a target of convenience, arrested to make a diplomatic statement. Since 2003, Saberi has worked as a freelance journalist, reporting for the BBC, Fox, and NPR.
Most Western journalists working in the Islamic Republic self-censor to maintain access. The Ministries of Information, Foreign Affairs, and Culture and Islamic Guidance monitor foreign reports and blacklist any journalist who files reports not to the liking of Iranian authorities. Visas to Iran are a rare commodity, even for non-journalists, and the visas of critical reporters are not renewed and sometimes revoked.
Some Iranian Americans, like Saberi, get around the visa controls by traveling on Iranian passports. This carries risks, however. “She entered the country as an Iranian citizen and holds Iranian residency, passport and national identity card. Even if she has another citizenship, it will not affect the way we will proceed with her case,” her prosecutor, Hassan Haddad, said.
U.S. officials have expressed displeasure with the arrest, but there is every reason to believe the Iranians do not take them seriously. Addressing Washington, Iranian president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad told an April 15 campaign rally in the southern Iranian city of Kerman, “You today are in a position of weakness and you can’t achieve anything.”
Saberi’s fate is in the air. Robert Mackey, a blogger for the New York Times, speculated that Iranian authorities view Saberi as a hostage, a bargaining chip to win the release of alleged Qods Force operatives seized by U.S. forces in Iraq. This is plausible. But for Obama, such bargaining would be a dangerous game to play.
(con't at source link above)
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