Rooyesh

A grandmother of two, Parnaz Azima seems an unlikely person to be accused of undermining Iran’s Islamic republic. But she is one of four Iranian-Americans facing charges in Tehran in what the US State Department on Thursday called a ”disturbing pattern” of harassment of dual citizens. Ms Azima was as surprised as anyone this week when Iran’s judiciary spokesman said she had been charged with “acting against national security”.

Two weeks earlier an interrogator had told the broadcaster she was charged with the less serious offence of earning “illegitimate” money and making “propaganda” against Iran in her work for the US-funded Radio Farda. But now it seemed Ms Azima, who is not in prison but cannot leave Iran, was being lumped together with other Iranian-Americans who, unlike her, were accused of spying. “I simply don’t know what’s going on,” she told the Financial Times. “Legally speaking, there are differences between these allegations.” A US campaign to free the four – including Ali Shakeri, a businessman whose detention was confirmed yesterday by the State Department – by politicians and officials is gathering steam, but the cases are far from straightforward. Abdol-Fattah Soltani, a lawyer for Haleh Esfandiari, held in prison since May 8, said he was unsure his client, a 63-year-old academic, had been charged with spying, despite Tuesday’s statement by the judicial spokesman that she was one of two people accused of “acting against national security” and carrying out “espionage for aliens”. “We don’t have a crime called ‘acting against national security’ and it’s not even clear what espionage means,” Mr Soltani, who is denied access to his client, told the FT. “Any prisoner must by law be told within 24 hours of arrest what charges he is facing.” Ms Azima said her four-hour interrogation on May 15 ended with her accepting to pay bail of $545,500 (€406,000, £276,000) which was guaranteed with the deeds of her mother’s Tehran apartment. The interrogator, Majid Hemmati-Rasekh, represented the security section of the Revolutionary Justice Department, the part of the judiciary that deals with national security and espionage charges. Ms Azima has been unable to leave Iran since January 25 when her Iranian passport was confiscated by airport officials. “There was only one interrogator, who was very polite,” Ms Azima said. “He asked for ‘cooperation’, like giving them information if I find out for instance when the US plans to make explosions in some ethnic areas in Iran. I told him I would call the police, for humanitarian reasons, if I found out about any explosions anywhere.” The question derived from Iran’s concern over alleged US and British support for militants in border provinces of Kurdistan, Khuzestan and Sistan-Baluchestan, home respectively to Kurd, Arab and Baluchi minorities. Ms Azima said she had not been asked about her links with the other Iranian-Americans. Mohammad-Hossein Aghasi, Ms Azima’s lawyer, said the interrogator considered her work for Radio Farda a criminal act and said that any earnings should be paid to the Iranian government. The Persian-language station, was established in 1998 by Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, which is funded by the US Congress and committed to “democratic values and civil societies for countries that are struggling to overcome autocratic institutions”. It broadcasts, from Prague, a diet of western and Iranian pop music, interlaced with news. But while some drivers like to tune in its impact has not lived up to its original billing. The case against Ms Azima appears less serious than those against Ms Esfandiari, who heads the Middle East programme of the Washington-based Woodrow Wilson center, and Kian Tajbakhsh, 45, an associate of the New York-based Open Society Institute arrested on May 11 and who, according to the judiciary spokesman, faces the same charges as Ms Esfandiari. Iran has not yet confirmed the arrest of Mr Shakeri, 59, a leading member of the Centre for Citizen Peacebuilding, a US non-governmental organisation. But Washington yesterday voiced its concern over his detention. His case is perhaps the most serious of the four. Kayhan, a leading conservative newspaper has called him a “CIA agent” and alleged that he worked for Savak, the intelligence service of the Shah, before the 1979 Islamic Revolution.

The Financial Times