Mojtaba (Madyar) Saminejad (, born 30 September 1980 in

Tehran Tehran (; , ''Tehrân'') is the capital and largest city of Iran. It is the capital of Tehran province, and the administrative center for Tehran County and its Central District (Tehran County), Central District. With a population of around 9. ...

) is an Iranian blogger and

writer A writer is a person who uses written words in different writing styles, genres and techniques to communicate ideas, to inspire feelings and emotions, or to entertain. Writers may develop different forms of writing such as novels, short sto ...

. He studied

journalism Journalism is the production and distribution of reports on the interaction of events, facts, ideas, and people that are the "news of the day" and that informs society to at least some degree of accuracy. The word, a noun, applies to the journ ...

at the Central Tehran Branch of

Islamic Azad University The Islamic Azad University (IAU; , ''Dāneshgāh-e Āzād-e Eslāmi'') is a Private university, private university system Headquarters, headquartered in Tehran, Iran. It is one of the largest comprehensive systems of university, universities in ...

. He is the president of Shahr-e Khorshid publications () and editor of ''Ferdowsi'' magazine.

Activities

As a student, Saminejad was a writer and blogger. In 2004

Reporters Without Borders Reporters Without Borders (RWB; ; RSF) is an international non-profit and non-governmental organisation, non-governmental organization headquartered in Paris, which focuses on safeguarding the right to freedom of information. It describes its a ...

listed his as one of the ''Best blogs defending freedom of expression''. Saminejad's initial arrest on November 1, 2004, followed the publication on his blog of the arrests of three other bloggers. He was released on bail on January 27, 2005, relaunched his blog at a new address. It was promptly re-arrested on February 12, 2005. His bail was doubled to $125,000, which he could not pay. He was charged with "insulting the prophets" (punishable by the

death penalty Capital punishment, also known as the death penalty and formerly called judicial homicide, is the state-sanctioned killing of a person as punishment for actual or supposed misconduct. The sentence ordering that an offender be punished in s ...

under Article 512 of the Iranian Islamic

penal code A criminal code or penal code is a document that compiles all, or a significant amount of, a particular jurisdiction's criminal law. Typically a criminal code will contain Crime, offences that are recognised in the jurisdiction, penalties that ...

), "endangering national security", and "insulting the

Supreme Leader A supreme leader or supreme ruler typically refers to powerful figures with an unchallenged authority, such as autocrats, dictators to spiritual and revolutionary leaders. Historic examples are Adolf Hitler () of Nazi Germany, Francisco ...

" (the

head of state A head of state is the public persona of a sovereign state.#Foakes, Foakes, pp. 110–11 "

he head of state He or HE may refer to: Language * He (letter), the fifth letter of the Semitic abjads * He (pronoun), a pronoun in Modern English * He (kana), one of the Japanese kana (へ in hiragana and ヘ in katakana) * Ge (Cyrillic), a Cyrillic letter cal ...

being an embodiment of the State itself or representative of its international persona." The name given to the office of head of sta ...

of Iran). On June 2, 2005, he was found guilty of "insulting the Supreme Leader", and sentenced to two years imprisonment by Judge Saadat of Revolutionary Court 13. On June 28, 2005, he was found not guilty of "insulting the prophets". One month later he was sentenced to an extra ten months in prison for incitement to "immorality". During his arrest, Saminejad was allegedly held in solitary confinement for 88 days and subjected to beatings and

torture Torture is the deliberate infliction of severe pain or suffering on a person for reasons including corporal punishment, punishment, forced confession, extracting a confession, interrogational torture, interrogation for information, or intimid ...

. He was taken in handcuffs to sit his exams at Tehran's Azad University on 21 January 2006. After 21 months, on September 13, 2006 he was released from prison and started blogging again. He also works with an Iranian human-rights group, Human Rights Activists in Iran, which gathers information about how Iranians are repressed. In 2009 he signed an open letter of apology posted to Iranian.com along with 266 other Iranian academics, writers, artists, journalists about the Iranian

persecution of Baháʼís Baháʼís are persecuted in various countries, especially in Iran, where the Baháʼí Faith originated and where one of the largest Baháʼí populations in the world is located. The origins of the persecution stem from a variety of Baháʼ ...

Works

* Fiction ** 2004 ''Ambiguous People'' (), a short surreal story in

Persian Persian may refer to: * People and things from Iran, historically called ''Persia'' in the English language ** Persians, the majority ethnic group in Iran, not to be conflated with the Iranic peoples ** Persian language, an Iranian language of the ...

Awards and honors

* 2004 – ''Best blogs defending freedom of expression'' (Reporters Without Borders)

References

External links

Mojtaba Saminejad's current blog

Saminejad's former blog
{{DEFAULTSORT:Saminejad, Mojtaba Iranian bloggers Iranian journalists 1980 births Living people Islamic Azad University, Central Tehran Branch alumni

Activities

Works

Awards and honors

See also

References

External links