Another journalist found guilty of spying in Iran.

valkyrie

Well-Known Member
Iran Sentences U.S. Journalist to 8 Years
TEHRAN, Iran (CNN) -- A U.S. journalist in Iran was sentenced to eight years in prison for espionage, her father, lawyer and news reports said Saturday -- a sentence that prompted denunciation from the United States

Reports in Iranian media, including an Iranian judiciary source quoted Saturday by the semi-official Iranian Students News Agency, confirmed the sentence of Roxana Saberi, a 31-year-old Iranian-American from North Dakota.

U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said she was "deeply disappointed" by the news. "We are working closely with the Swiss Protecting Presence to obtain details about the court's decision, and to ensure her well-being," Clinton said in a statement.
<<snippety snip>>

Saberi's lawyer confirmed the sentence and vowed an appeal would be launched within 20 days.
<<snippety snip>>

The case has unfolded as the Obama administration has signaled an inclination to engage diplomatically with Iran, America's long-term adversary. The countries have been at odds for years over Iran's nuclear program and Iranian actions and stances in the Middle East, such as the regime's links to Hamas and Hezbollah and its alleged support of insurgents in Iraq.

Saberi has been living in Iran since 2003, according to the Committee to Protect Journalists, a journalists' advocacy group.

She has freelanced for National Public Radio and other news organizations, and was writing a book about Iranian culture. NPR said she also reported for BBC, ABC and Fox.

Her media credentials were revoked in 2006 by the Ministry of Culture and Islamic Guidance, which accredits reporters working for foreign news organizations, CPJ reported.

"According to NPR, Saberi continued to file short news items with government permission," CPJ said.

Saberi was first detained in January, CPJ said, although no formal charges were disclosed.

"She told her family that she was initially held for buying a bottle of wine," CPJ said on its Web site. "A spokesman for Iran's Foreign Ministry said later that Saberi was being detained at Tehran's Evin Prison for reporting without proper accreditation."

Political prisoners are often jailed at the prison, CPJ said.

Word that Saberi was charged with espionage emerged on April 8, CPJ said. Hassan Haddad, deputy public prosecutor, told the Iranian Students News Agency that "without press credentials and under the name of being a reporter, she was carrying out espionage activities."

She appeared before a Revolutionary Court on Monday for a one-day trial that was closed to the public, CPJ said, quoting an Iranian judiciary official.

Her father, Reza Saberi, told NPR on Saturday he believes his daughter was coerced into making damaging statements. He said the verdict was issued Wednesday.

The court, which didn't meet Thursday and Friday, reconvened Saturday. Reza Saberi said his daughter was brought to the court, but he wasn't allowed to enter.

A lawyer later told him she was sentenced to eight years in prison for espionage.

Reza Saberi said his daughter had earlier wanted to go on a hunger strike but she was persuaded not to. However, he said there is a chance she might do so now in light of the verdict.

Reza Saberi said his daughter is "very weak and frail."

"She is quite depressed about this matter and she wants to go on hunger strike. If she does, she's so frail it can be very dangerous to her health."

Others also denounced the verdict.

"Roxana Saberi's trial lacked transparency and we are concerned that she may not have been treated fairly," said Mohamed Abdel Dayem, the CPJ Middle East and North Africa program coordinator. "We call on the Iranian authorities to release her on bail pending her appeal."

Vivian Schiller, NPR's president and chief executive officer, said the network is "deeply distressed by this harsh and unwarranted sentence."

"Saberi has already endured a three-month confinement in Evin Prison, and we are very concerned for her well-being. Through her work for NPR over several years, we know her as an established and respected professional journalist.

"We appeal to all of those who share our concerns to ask that the Iranian authorities show compassion and allow her to return home to the United States immediately with her parents."

<<snippety snip... quotes from people denouncing the actions of the Iranian judicial system and goverment.>>

Saberi isn't the only American in peril in Iran.

Earlier this month, at a conference on Afghanistan in Netherlands, Clinton sent a letter to the Iranian delegation asking for information on and the safe release of Saberi Esha Momeni, an Iranian-American student arrested in Iran last October.

Clinton also inquired about Robert Levinson, a former FBI agent who disappeared in Iran in March 2007.

One U.S. senator suggested earlier this year that Iran may be holding Levinson in a bid to exchange him for Iranian officials seized by U.S. troops in Iraq in 2007.

"On several diplomatic occasions when Bob Levinson's name has been brought up to Iranian officials, the standard answer is, 'We don't know anything about that.' But the next thing out of the Iranian officials' mouths are to discuss the matter of the Iranians held by the Americans in Irbil, Iraq," Sen. Bill Nelson, a Florida Democrat, told reporters in February.

"You can draw your own conclusions," he said.

U.S. troops arrested five Iranians accused of being members of an elite Iranian military unit during a January 2007 raid in the Iraqi city of Irbil.

They were accused of supporting Shiite militias in Iraq, but Iran said they were diplomats and accused the United States of violating international law by raiding a consulate.
 

Gato_Solo

Out-freaking-standing OTC member
When you go to a country that is unfriendly to the government, you should expect unfriendly things to happen. :shrug: Pretty simple.
 

valkyrie

Well-Known Member
When you go to a country that is unfriendly to the government, you should expect unfriendly things to happen. :shrug: Pretty simple.
Ahmadinejad is not winning any allies with this action. And I agree, if you go to a country unfriendly to your home country... you are at risk of losing your life or liberty.

This doesn't mean our government (and other governments) can't work toward her release.
 

Professur

Well-Known Member
Isn't it strange that they keep sending wimmen spies into a country where wimmen are treated as slightly less important than goats? A country where a woman even speaking without her husband's permission is expected to be beaten. Particularly under a guise that immediately draws intense scrutiny. You'd not think that spying while every law enforcement agency is looking for a reason to have you raped in the town square by a dozen goats would be very productive. Show what little I know about spying, eh?
 

2minkey

bootlicker
Isn't it strange that they keep sending wimmen spies into a country where wimmen are treated as slightly less important than goats? A country where a woman even speaking without her husband's permission is expected to be beaten.

um right but that stuff is also very much under contention, with a significant chunk of the population very much NOT being down with the ayatollah.

or perhaps she should just be a good girl and not stir things up? golly, thems bitches that don't wanna follow the rules.. i tells ya...
:lol2:
 

Gato_Solo

Out-freaking-standing OTC member
Ahmadinejad is not winning any allies with this action. And I agree, if you go to a country unfriendly to your home country... you are at risk of losing your life or liberty.

This doesn't mean our government (and other governments) can't work toward her release.


So...we need to expend our national resources to rescue someone who went somewhere that is on our bad-boy list knowing that that place was unfriendly? I disagree.
 

Cerise

Well-Known Member
But 0bama kisses ass so well with our enemies. I'm sure he'll make everything O.K. :rolleyes:

The Obama administration has asked a federal judge to throw out a lawsuit against Iran filed by Americans held hostage at the U.S. Embassy in Tehran 30 years ago.

The lawsuit says the hostages were tortured, beaten sometimes until they lost consciousness and kept in fear of their lives, at times even lined up in front of marksmen locking their guns. It says they were imprisoned without adequate food, clothing or medical care, blindfolded with their hands tied, interrogated for hours at a time and kept in isolation for months at a time.

ahmadinejad79.jpg
 
But 0bama kisses ass so well with our enemies. I'm sure he'll make everything O.K. :rolleyes:



hostage.jpg

Maybe he did it because A. it's ridiculous, and even if a judgment is issued against Iran, they will never pay, there is no way to enforce it, and it isn't even the same people in power; B. because it is 30 years ago. Don't you think it's time to move on and not clog an already overburdened court system with useless lawsuits?

I hate to sunshine on your rainy day, but I have heard more than one Republican say, (and when I say Republican I am speaking of sensible, rational and reasonable people who see things clearly) that Obama is nobody's puppet and that is a fact. Just because he isn't initiating frivolous military actions like you wish he would, make no mistake, those Republicans who actually know something besides the paranoid fantasies and delusions you suffer from, know that if provoked he will take decisive action. I am sure whatever action he takes and no matter how well things go, and how successful he is it will piss you off, but thank God for all of us that your opinion is entirely irrelevant, except on election days. That really goes for everyone here.

:lol2:
 

Cerise

Well-Known Member
Another slap in the face for the US from 0bama. Maybe he will pay Iran for their stress over the lawsuit all these years.

Keep the lawsuit.

image4.png


Dump the empty suit.
 

Inkara1

Well-Known Member
So how long do you think her hunger strike will keep going? She's at, what, a week so far?

I would really be jonesing for a cheeseburger or some tacos right about now, that's for sure.
 
How about I sue you Cerise for saying such dumb ass things and shaking my faith in human kind? It's just about as ridiculous, but what the hell....Watch out you might get served soon!
 

valkyrie

Well-Known Member
So...we need to expend our national resources to rescue someone who went somewhere that is on our bad-boy list knowing that that place was unfriendly? I disagree.
?????? Wow, I'm confused.
This is what I wrote:
Originally Posted by valkyrie
Ahmadinejad is not winning any allies with this action. And I agree, if you go to a country unfriendly to your home country... you are at risk of losing your life or liberty.

This doesn't mean our government (and other governments) can't work toward her release.
In response to what you wrote here...
Originally Posted by Gato_Solo
When you go to a country that is unfriendly to the government, you should expect unfriendly things to happen. Pretty simple.
Working towards someone's release doesn't mean sending in the Marines to go rescue her. Bush tried to have Ayman Nour released from prison in Egypt. OK, so it took the Obama administration to make it happen, but the effort was there on Bush's part and I give that credit to him. Possibly Driven by U.S. Pressure, Egypt Frees No. 1 Political Prisoner

Anyway, my point is that there is no harm in sending someone to discuss the release of an American citizen who was unjustly imprisoned in a foreign country.
 

valkyrie

Well-Known Member
So how long do you think her hunger strike will keep going? She's at, what, a week so far?

I would really be jonesing for a cheeseburger or some tacos right about now, that's for sure.
The common answer is 4 to 6 weeks, depending on the person's health prior to the beginning of the hunger strike. Most people who undergo a hunger strike will take in water because the human body can not last more than 3 to 5 days without water.

Mohandas Gandhi went on a hunger strike for 21 days at the age of 70. He sustained himself with water mixed with something, but I can't recall what (it might have been cow's milk or something).
 
You know valkyrie, the trouble that always makes so many conservatives inept at foreign policy, (and if you don't think the Bush administration was inept, either you weren't paying attention or just don't have the capacity to understand) is that they have a fight first, wanna be "tough guy" mentality and it never has and never will work!

Let me put it this way. If you were my neighbor and you had a party that went late and the music was loud, if I go over to ask politely and respectfully for you to tone it down, there is a hell of a lot better likelihood of my success than if I go over and tell you you you are a piece of shit and I am going to beat your ass if you don't keep it down. Now if I ask politely and do not get cooperation, then I am going to be willing to call the cops, to use the necessary measures to resolve the issue, and no more. But the chances are I will have a lot more success with the first approach than the second. I'm not some kind of pacifist that thinks that military action is never warranted, but it is a last resort, and should be used with great discretion.

This is what Obama understands, is that no matter what we think of another sovereign nations actions and policies, we need to treat them with respect first. The old adage that you'll get more flies with honey than vinegar comes into play big time. A bit of respect and communication can go a lot farther than threats in most cases. Another adage comes to mind though, one we have not been practicing but should is "talk softly but carry a big stick". I think Obama is doing just that. Bush carried a big stick and brandished it and all it did was generate ill will toward America. But we should always respect other nation's sovereignty and exhaust all other options before we use military force, but when we do use military force, it needs to be full bore 100% effort and as quick of a resolve as is possible.

If you had wanted a Republican in office who was capable of such wisdom, in my opinion, you should have supported Ron Paul.
 

valkyrie

Well-Known Member
Ah, Teddy Roosevelt... "speak softly and carry a big stick". He wasn't bad as far as presidents go, being a politician and all.

Did you know he was the first American to win the Nobel Peace Prize?

Ron Paul... hmmmm... he's too much of a nut. If he would just chill out I could take him more seriously. Some of the wild shit he says... I just don't know whether he's just crazy or looking for attention. Jeeze!

I actually had a lot of respect for Senator McCain until he ran for president. I might not have agreed with his ideas but he voted against his party when he felt it was the right thing to do and that gained my respect. Then I watched him compromise himself into a goose-stepping, Evangelical-ass-kissing, fuck-tard. When Palin was announced as his running mate I knew he had just been shanked by his own party. McCain actually had a chance before Palin was put on the ticket. What a freak-job she was/is. She couldn't present herself to be more of an idiot than she did.

Anyway, I digress... what were we talking about? Oh, yes... journalist imprisoned in Iran.
 
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