Watchdog

Kasra Nouri, an Iranian journalist imprisoned for his religious association and for reporting on religious freedom, is now facing new charges.

Pouria Nouri, Kasra's brother, told RFERL’s Radio Farda that the Intelligence Organization of the southern city of Shiraz, claims that her sibling tried to sign a joint statement with other political prisoners, including Narges Mohammadi and Keyvan Samimi, prompting new allegations against him.

Farshid Yadollahi, Nouri's defense lawyer, said in a tweet on September 5 that his client is accused of "gathering and colluding to act against the security of the country."

On August 27, Kasra Nouri was transferred from the political ward of Adelabad prison in Shiraz to solitary confinement in the detention center of the Intelligence Department in the same city and has been under interrogation since.

This 32-year-old prisoner, a member of the Gonabadi Dervish religious community, was banned from visiting his family for a week and finally met his mother on September 5, relatives said.

Last week, Kasra's mother, Shokoofeh Yadollahi, demanded his release in a video published on social networks, warning authorities that "the period of your oppression of the people will finally end one day."

Security officials detained Kasra Nouri among more than 300 others following protests in 2018 that included violent clashes between Dervishes, who are Sufi Muslims, and security forces in the capital, Tehran.

The sentences included prison terms ranging from 4 months to 26 years, flogging, internal exile, travel bans, and a ban on membership in social and political groups.

Sufism, a mystical branch of Islam, is not illegal in Iran but rights groups accuse the Iranian government of harassment and discrimination against its followers. The United States has called the repression of the Dervishes the largest repression of religious minorities in Iran.

In recent weeks, Iranian authorities have ramped up their crackdown against religious minorities, arresting about a dozen of Baha’is and raiding the homes and businesses of many others across Iran.

UN experts have called for the immediate and unconditional release of all individuals detained on the basis of their religious affiliation, and accountability for the systematic persecution of religious minorities by Iranian authorities.

Written by Ardeshir Tayebi

BISHKEK -- Kyrgyz authorities have again closed a case looking into the assassination of independent journalist Alisher Saipov, who was shot dead in the southern city of Osh almost 15 years ago.

A spokesman for the Prosecutor-General's Office, Sirojiddin Kamolidinov, told RFE/RL on September 6 that the case was closed again because "it is impossible to find and bring to justice individuals who were involved in the killing."

Kyrgyz authorities reopened the case in August 2019 after a court decreed that it should be revisited.

Saipov, the founder and chief editor of the newspaper Siyosat (Politics), was shot dead in central Osh on October 24, 2007, at the age of 26. He was also a contributor to RFE/RL and Voice of America.

Saipov's Uzbek-language weekly, which was distributed both in Kyrgyzstan and Uzbekistan, stopped publishing after the murder.

In 2010, a court in Osh found local resident Abdulgafar Rasulov guilty of killing Saipov and sentenced him to 20 years in prison.

However, Saipov's relatives protested against the sentence. They argued that a deeper plot was at the heart of the crime and that the "real killers" and those who planned the murder were not punished.

Saipov, an ethnic Uzbek, wrote about Islamic groups and opposition politics in the region. He had also reported on the 2005 massacre of protesters in the Uzbek city of Andijon.

In 2012, the Kyrgyz Interior Ministry launched a fresh investigation into Saipov's murder, citing "new leads" in the case. However, the new investigation failed to identify any new suspects involved in the killing.

The case was initially closed in 2013.