Alert

EU foreign ministers urged to put pressure on Iran over murder of journalist Zahra Kazemi

Incident details

Zahra Kazemi

journalist(s)

killed

This is available in:

English Français

(RSF/IFEX) - RSF has written to each of the European Union's (EU) 15 foreign ministers, urging them to put pressure on Iran over the murder of Zahra Kazemi, a journalist with both Iranian and Canadian citizenship. The letter was also addressed to the foreign ministers of the 10 countries that will soon join the EU, which has been conducting a "constructive dialogue" with Iran since 1998.

"We would like to formally ask you to do everything in your power to get the Iranian authorities to agree to the formation of an independent commission of inquiry that would include international experts," RSF Secretary-General Robert Ménard wrote. "Those responsible for Kazemi's death must be identified, brought to trial and punished," he added. The organisation also asked EU foreign ministers to support Canada in its representations to the Iranian authorities.

A resident of Canada, Kazemi was on a visit to Iran when she was detained on 23 June 2003 while photographing the relatives of detainees outside Evin prison, north of Tehran. She was beaten while in custody and died as a result of her injuries on 11 July.

The Iranian authorities at first tried to conceal the causes of her death. But on 16 July, Vice-President Ali Abtahi admitted that Kazemi had been "beaten." Nonetheless, her body was hastily buried on 22 July in the southern town of Chiraz, even though her mother, a resident of Iran, initially asked that her daughter's body be repatriated to Canada. On 30 July, Kazemi's mother acknowledged that she had been pressured into giving permission for the body to be buried in Iran. The Canadian authorities have asked repeatedly for the body's repatriation, ever since Kazemi's death was announced.

Some reformist parliamentarians have gone so far as to blame Kazemi's death on the judiciary, a conservative stronghold. Tehran Prosecutor Said Mortazavi is said to have concealed the circumstances of the death and to have pushed for a rapid burial. In a letter published in newspapers on 24 July, Mohammad Hussein Khoshvagt, foreign press director at the Culture Ministry, acknowledged that Mortazavi had forced him to announce that Kazemi's death was due to a cerebral haemorrhage. Mortazavi allegedly accused Khoshvagt (who is in charge of issuing press visas to foreigners) of issuing a visa to a spy.

Reformist parliamentarian Mohsen Amin said it was Mortazavi who gave the order for Kazemi's death to be attributed to a cerebral haemorrhage, and who pressed the family to bury her very quickly. Amin also said that Kazemi told police officers who questioned her that she had been hit on the head.

Another reformist parliamentarian, Elaheh Koulaie, attributed Kazemi's death to a climate of press censorship and hostility to any criticism.

On 30 July, Vice-President Abtahi spoke openly of "murder." On 11 August, the spokesman for the judiciary, Gholam Hossein Elham, recognised that Kazemi died as a result of a blow to the head, but said individuals were at fault, rather than an institution.

The use of torture appears to be common in Iranian prisons. In an open letter dated 9 July, President Khatami's brother called for measures to prevent abuses against political prisoners. Moreover, after leading a United Nations Commission on Human Rights fact-finding mission to Iran in February, Louis Joinet voiced concern about conditions of detention, especially the widespread use of solitary confinement which, he said, was broadly imposed and could be considered as a "prison within a prison" (see IFEX alerts of 4 March and 19 February 2003).