Iranian-American Scholar Arrested In Tehran

(RFE/RL) May 9, 2007 -- Iranian-born American academic Haleh Esfandiari has been arrested in Tehran after being barred from leaving the country four months ago.

International newspapers reported that Esfandiari, the director of the Woodrow Wilson International Center's Middle East Program in Washington, has endured repeated interrogations about her work and was taken to prison on May 8.

Esfandiari's husband, Shaul Bakhash, said she left Iran at the time of the 1979 Islamic Revolution and had returned twice annually over the past decade to visit her ailing mother.

(compiled from "The New York Times" and "Financial Times" reports)