Cyrus Farivar
-
Portrait of a year in Bonn
Crazy to believe. Our one-year anniversary of arriving in Bonn was on Friday. I’m trying to run through a mental list of all of the things that we’ve done, seen, eaten, traveled to, and people we’ve met since we first set foot in Bonn on March 25, 2010. (Reviewing my Twitter posts helps too.) Departed Oakland. Arrived, bags in hand. First stayed: Hotel Ibis. First dinner: Mediterraneo. Bonn puns. First apartment (danke, Thomas and Couchsurfing!) in the Bonn Altstadt. Cherry…
-
Fmr. US State Dept. official in Tehran Henry Precht on WikiLeaks
The following message was sent to the Gulf2000 email list on December 19, 2010 and is re-printed here below with his permission. Henry Precht is a retired Foreign Service officer who was country director for Iran during the Iranian Revolution and subsequent hostage crisis. -CF As I understand it, Wikileaks has captured a huge half of State Department cable reports — the less interesting half. As Frank Rettenberg has written, the really good stuff is sent under captions (EXDIS, NODIS,…
-
Iranian blogging pioneer temporarily released from prison
I just filed this latest update to the ongoing Hoder saga. Iranian-Canadian blogger Hossein Derakhshan was temporarily released from a Tehran prison, after having been incarcerated for 26 months, according to a report Thursday on Mashregh News, a conservative Iranian news website. The site was among the first to report Derakhshan’s conviction at the end of September on charges of “conspiring with hostile governments, disseminating anti-Islamic propaganda, disseminating anti-revolutionary propaganda, blasphemy, and operating and managing obscene pornography websites.” The account…
-
Joint French-Canadian statement in support of Hossein Derakhshan
Joint Declaration by Canada and France (No. 341 – October 20, 2010 – 1:15 p.m. ET) The Honourable Lawrence Cannon, Minister of Foreign Affairs of Canada, and Bernard Kouchner (pictured), Minister of Foreign and European Affairs of France, made the following statement today concerning Canadian-Iranian blogger Hossein Derakhshan, who is detained in Iran. Mr. Derakhshan is a Canadian citizen and his companion is a French national. “We are jointly requesting that the Iranian authorities release Canadian-Iranian blogger Hossein Derakhshan, who…
-
Rebecca Farivar to publish her first book in 2011
My beautiful and brilliant wife, Rebecca Farivar, is getting her first book of poetry — tentatively titled Conception — published by Octopus Books in 2011. That means both of our books will be coming out next year! Hooray! Discounts will surely be in effect for the Double Farivar Pack!
-
UK Minister for Europe David Lidington speaks out for Hossein Derakhshan
As per the , David Lidington has spoken out against the arrest of Hossein Derakhshan.
-
My audio portrait of Hossein Derakhshan (Nov. 2009)
Over all that’s been going on with Hossein Derakhshan lately, I thought I would repost this audio portrait that I did of him for the MediaShift website back in November 2009. You can listen to it here (it’s around 19 minutes long): [audio:http://cyrusfarivar.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2010/09/hoder.mp3]
-
Canadian FM Lawrence Cannon on Hossein Derakhshan’s jail sentence
I emailed the Ministry of Foreign Affairs in Ottawa and received this statement back from Melissa Lantsman, on behalf of Canada’s Foreign Minister, Lawrence Cannon. “We are deeply concerned about the news of this severe sentence. Our officials continue to seek confirmation of these reports from Tehran. If true, this is completely unacceptable and unjustifiable. Canada believes that no one should be punished anywhere for simply exercising one’s inherent right to freedom of expression. His situation is complicated by his…
-
Hossein Derakhshan sentenced to 19.5 years in prison
A conservative Persian news website, Mashregh News, is reporting that Iranian-Canadian blogging pioneer Hossein Derakhshan has been found guilty of “conspiring with hostile governments, disseminating anti-Islamic propaganda, disseminating anti-revolutionary propaganda, blasphemy, annd operating and managing obscene pornography websites.” He is ordered to serve 19.5 years in prison, is banned for five years from joining any Iranian political party and is required to pay €30,750, $2,900 and 200 British pounds. The article also states that the sentence can be appealed. Upon…
-
Paris Mayor Bertrand Delanoë speaks out for Hossein Derakhshan
The mayor of Paris, Bertrand Delanoë, released a statement (in French) today in support of Hossein Derakhshan. I have translated it below to the best of my ability. —BEGIN ENGLISH TRANSLATION— I have learned with dismay and the utmost concern that the death penalty was requested, Wednesday, September 22, by the prosecutor of Tehran, at the trial of the young blogger, Hossein Derakhshan. He is a high cultural figure and is a figure for freedom of expression in an also-threatened…
