FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Date of event: 4 February 2012
Time of event: 2:00 pm to 3:00 pm
Location of event: Embassy of Iran, 245 Metcalfe Street
“Enough is enough! Let’s bring Saeed home!”
A group of activists and concerned citizens are heading to the Iranian embassy in Ottawa on Saturday to protest against the imminent execution of Canadian resident Saeed Malekpour. The hour long event, which begins at 2:00pm, will include speeches by Alexe Neve, the Secretary General of Amnesty International Canada, Ardeshir Zarezadeh, the director of the International Center for Human Rights in Iran, and Farah Mawani, the co-founder of the Free the Hikers campaign to free Sarah Shourd, Shane Bauer and Josh Fattal. Farah played a central role in building the Free the Hikers campaign to a global level, ultimately leading to the release of Sarah, Shane and Josh on September 21, 2011. Now she is helping to free Saeed Malekpour.
Saeed Malekpour, a tech expert and freelance computer programmer, was arrested in Iran in October 2008, a few days after he had arrived from Canada to visit his ailing father (Saeed’s father died from a brain tumor shortly after Saeed was imprisoned). In January 2012, Iran’s Supreme Court suspiciously upheld Saeed’s execution sentence that was reinstated by the Tehran Revolutionary Court in November 2011. Saeed was originally sentenced to death in October 2010, but the Supreme Court quashed the death sentence due to discrepancies in Saeed’s case file and called on the Revolutionary Court to conduct a full judicial review and investigation into the discrepancies. However, Saeed’s current death sentence has been confirmed and the discrepancies in the case file still exist. Saeed is convicted of “Corrupting society” and “Insulting and desecrating the principles of Islam” through Internet-related activities that have never been proven in the Iranian court of law. The only evidence that has been used to condemn Saeed to death are false confessions he gave two years ago while subjected to physical and psychological torture.
Saeed has never been examined by a doctor regarding his torture wounds and a legal expert has never been brought in the trial to investigate the heavy charges.
“By confirming Saeed Malekpour’s death sentence after an unfair trial, the Iranian authorities are sending a message to Iranians not to freely express their views, or even to help others to do so, including on the internet,” said Ann Harrison, Amnesty International’s interim Deputy Director for the Middle East and North Africa.
People like Saeed who have never received fair treatment by the Iranian Judiciary, risk execution because they are being used as scapegoats to fulfill the oppressive regime’s shameful crusade against humanity.
Fortunately, brutal assaults on the free-flow of information have moved the international community to speak out louder in support of suppressed citizens.
We hope you can help spread Saeed’s story by reporting on the protest. Saeed has suffered for more than three years in Evin prison and it is time to bring him home to Canada. Enough is enough! We hope to see you there.
For further inquiries, please contact:
Hassan Zarezadeh Ardeshir
Executive director of ICHR
Phone: +647-860-8485
Email: info {at} humanrightsintl.com