Free Iranian journalists and political prisoners, stop the persecution of independent press in Iran
141 signers. Let's reach 100
Why this is important
Since the disputed presidential elections of June 2009, the Islamic Republic of Iran has been one of the biggest prison for journalists in the world. The suppression of a free and independent press, as well as the arrests, the unfair trials and the hard sentences against more than one hundred of Iranian journalists, have been the main tools that the regime used to stop the path toward freedom and democracy of Iranian people, by preventing the free circulation of informations and the free expression of opinions and criticisms against the regime itself. More than two hundreds of newspaper have been suppressed by regime's censoring in the last dozen years and hundreds of journalists were forced to flee the country after 2009 elections.
The situation of Iranian journalists imprisoned should be also considered along with the situation of other thousands of Iranian political prisoners: student activists, defenders of human rights, lawyers, activists for gender equality, dissidents, artists, members of ethnic and religious minorities.
We ask both main Iranian authority (the Supreme Leader) and the Head of Iranian judiciary to cease the persecution against journalists and all political prisoners, because they are the authority who have the power to do it. We address the petition also to UN Secretary and Un Special Rapporteur for Human Rights in Iran in order that they will put under even more pressure Iranian regime to stop harassing the independent press. And we address the same petition also to International Federation of Journalists as we are convinced that a large mobilization of journalists from all around the world is much needed to protect their fellow colleagues in Iran.
We believe that the fight for the freedom of press in Iran and for the release of all the journalists who are currently political prisoners is not a "corporative" fight, but a fight for the freedom of expression, opinion and information of all Iranian people. There can not be a free and democratic Iran without an independent press, and the chance of journalists to report clearly and widely what happens in the country is the first step leading to a change coming from within Iran, and not imposed from outside by threats and weapons.
