120 Academics and Activists Join UN in Calling on Iran to Free Princeton Scholar Xiyue Wang

CHRI – A group of 120 academics and human rights activists of Iranian origin have called on Iran to free imprisoned American scholar Xiyue Wang, who was arrested in Tehran by agents of Iran’s Intelligence Ministry during the summer of 2016 and sentenced to 10 years in prison on unsubstantiated espionage charges a year later.

The signatories, including prominent Iranian scholars and the Nobel Peace Laureate Shirin Ebadi, made the call in a letter addressed to the UN Working Group on Arbitrary Detention, which recently found that there “no legal basis” for Wang’s arrest and detention and called for his immediate release.

*The letter has been published below in both English and Farsi in its original form with no modifications apart from including the full hyperlinks.

A United Nations Working Group Exposes Iran’s Extortion Policy

September 27, 2018

Dear members of the UN Working Group on Arbitrary Detention,

We the undersigned, a group of Iranian academics and human rights activists residing outside the country, wish to thank the United Nations Working Group on Arbitrary Detention for investigating the imprisonment of Mr. Xiyue Wang in Iran and concluding that there is “no legal basis for his arrest and detention.” The New York Times covers the story with more details.

We join the U. N. Working Group to demand the immediate release of Mr. Wang. The truth is that Mr. Wang is a hostage and the purpose of Iran’s theocrats is either to swap him for their convicted agents detained in the United States or collect money for his release. This is exactly what the Iranian government did when it arrested three American hikers – Joshua Fattal, Sarah Shourd and Shane Bauer – in the border area of Iran and Iraq in 2009.

Sarah Shourd was released 14 months later on “humanitarian grounds.” Fattal and Bauer were convicted to eight years imprisonment for “illegal entry” and “espionage.” Two years after their arrest each was released for payment of $465,000 arranged by the Sultan of Oman.

The same kind of swap took place in 2016 when four dual citizen hostages, including the Washington Post correspondent Jason Rezaaian, were release in exchange for cash.

The Iranian judiciary is a tool of the theocratic state. It rejects the very idea of due process and recognizes no limit in mistreating its victims. As Ms. Hua Du, Mr. Wang’s wife, writes in the Princeton University website, “my husband has undergone many cruelties, from being kidnapped to enduring solitary confinement, repeated interrogations, humiliating treatment, harsh living conditions, unjust legal proceedings, and immense emotional distress.”

This is the way the Islamic Republic treats dissident scholars, human rights lawyers, intellectuals and promoters of civil society. Amnesty International, Human Rights Watch, International Federation for Human Rights, Defenders of Human Rights Center, and Center for Human Rights in Iran have documented the catastrophic violations of human rights in the Islamic Republic of Iran over the past four decades. Ms. Nargess Mohammadi, an internationally recognized human rights activist, has been sentenced to sixteen years incarceration for her opposition to death penalty and promotion of women’s rights. She is suffering from ailment in prison, but the authorities deny her even a temporary release for medical care. Abdolfattah Sultani, Nasrin Sotoudeh and other lawyers are serving time in prison for simply defending their clients whose sin is advocacy of resistance to such oppressive policies as mandatory veiling. Even a friend and spouse of these lawyers, Dr. Farhad Meisami and Reza Khandan, are detained in order to put pressure on the families and supporters of human rights activists.

We urge the United Nations Working Group on Arbitrary Detention to investigate the plight of Iranian political prisoners and urge the international community to condemn the egregious violations of human rights in Iran and demand immediate release of all political prisoners.

Full name and affiliation:

Aalam, Kourosh. Democracy Advocate

Afary, Frieda. Producer of Iranian Progressives in Translation

Afary, Janet, Ph.D., University of California, Santa Barbara

Afkhami, Mahnaz, Women’s Learning Partnership

Afshar, Mahasti, Ph.D., Independent Scholar

Afshari, Ali, Ph.D., George Washington University

Afshari, M. Reza, Ph.D., Pace University

Afshin Jam, A. Human Rights Advocate, Canada

Alamdari, Kazem, Ph.D. California State University, Northridge

Alavi, Hossein. Journalist

Alavi, Kianoush. Composer and song writer

Alinejad, Masih. Journalist and Women’s rights Activist

Amanat, Abbas, Ph.D., Yale University

Amanat, Mehrdad, Ph.D., University of California, Santa Barbara

Amani, Elahe. Women’s Rights Activist

Amini, Fariba. Journalist

Ardavan, Ershad.

Aryanpour, Houshang, Ph.D., Writer

Atabaki, Touraj, Ph.D., International Institute of Social History in Amsterdam

Azar, Shokoofeh. Writer

Bagheri, Hossein. Human rights activist

Baghi, Heibatollah, Ph.D., George Mason University

Bakhash, Shaul, Ph.D. George Mason University

Banuazizi, Ali, Ph.D., Boston University

Barati, Mehran, MD, Future Trends Analyses

Basiri, Nasim. Women’s Rights Activist and Poet

Bayat, Behrouz, Ph.D.

Boroujerdi, Mehrzad, Ph.D., Syracuse University

Chehabi, Houchang E., Ph.D., Boston University

Darabi Nasser. Democracy advocate

Davachi, Azadeh. Women’s rights activist

Darvishpour, Mehrdad, Ph.D., Stockholm University

Ebadi, Shirin, Nobel Laureate for Peace

Eghtedari, Mohammad, Ph.D., Retired Academician

Esfandiari, Haleh, Ph.D., Woodrow Wilson Center for Scholars

Etemadi, Nader. Human rights activist

Fallah, Soraya, California State University, Northridge

Farhang, Mansour, Ph.D., Bennington College, Vermont

Farhang, Yasmine. Immigration Lawyer and democracy advocate

Farid Ashkan. Human Right Activist

Farshim, Fariborz, Democracy advocate

Ghaemi, Hadi, Ph.D., Human Rights Center in Iran

Goharzad, Reza. Journalist

Ghorashi, Reza, Ph.D., Stockton University of New Jeresy

Hashemi, Nader, Ph.D., University of Denver

Haji-Hosseini, Reza, Journalist

Hatef, Elham, MD, Johns Hopkins University

Hoodfar, Homa, Ph.D., Concordia University, Montreal

Houdashtian, Ata, Ph.D., University of Geneva, Switzerland

Hosseini, Parvaneh. Worcester State University

Husseini, Nahid, Ph.D., Kingston University, London

Jafari, Farkhondeh, Women’s rights activist

Jaafari, Mahmood, Democracy advocate

Kar, Mehrangiz. Writer and Human Rights Activist

Karimi-Hakkak, Ahmad, Ph.D., University of Maryland

Kahnemuyipour, Arsalan, Ph.D., University of Toronto

Kamali, Mehrak, Ph.D., Ohio State University

Kardevani, Kazem, Ph.D., Chevalier dans l’Ordre des Palmes Académiques, France.

Karimi, Ali, Writer

Karimi-Hakkak, Ahmad. Ph.D., University of Maryland

Khorrami, Mehdi, Ph.D., NASA’s Langley Research Center

Khoshchehreh, Ashraf. Transparent California

Khun-Jush, Jamshid. Human rights activist

Kowsari, Hamid. Writer and human rights activist

Lackner-Gohari, Jaleh, MD, Austria

Loghmani, Mehrdad. Writer and human rights advocate

Mahdavi, Pardis, Ph.D., University of Denver

Mahdi, Ali-Akbar, Ph.D., California State University, Northridge

Maleki Mohammad, Ph.D., Former President of Tehran University, Iran

Maleki, Ammar, Ph.D., Tilburg University

Milani, Abbas, Ph.D., Stanford University

Mir-Hosseini, Ziba, Ph.D., SOAS, University of London

Mirsepassi, Ali, Ph.D., New York University

Moaddel, Mansoor, Ph.D., University of Maryland

Moghadam, Rezvan, Women’s rights activist

Moghissi, Haideh, Ph.D., York University, Canada

Momtaz, Amir Houshmand, Council of National Front of Iran

Monshipouri, Mahmood, Ph.D., San Francisco State University

Moshfeghi, Marmar, Women’s rights activist

Moshkani, Jamshid, Poet, translator

Naficy, Majid. Ph.D., Poet, writer, human rights activist

Navab, Mohamad, Ph.D., University of California, Los Angeles

Navaian, Davoud, Retired teacher, Sweden

Nayeb-Hashen, Hassan, MD, Human Rights Activist

Nooriala, Partow, Poet, writer, Human Rights activist

Nowakhtar, Shahrir, CPA, Human rights activist

Paivandi, Saeed, Ph.D., University of Lorraine (Nancy – France)

Parhami, Behrooz, Ph.D., University of California, Santa Barbara

Parsa, Koroush, Independent Scholar

Parsa, Misagh, Ph.D., Dartmouth College

Peykar, Shahin. Human rights activist

Pirzadeh, Bijan, Human Rights Activist

Pourzand, Azadeh. Siyamak Pourzand Foundation

Rahimieh, Nasrin, Ph.D., University of California, Irvine

Rahmanian, Kamal, Human Rights Activist

Rashidi, Saeed, Sharif University of Technology

Roshandel, Jalil, Ph.D., East Carolina University, Greenville, North Carolina

Sadeghi-Boroujerdi, Eskandar, Ph.D., University of Oxford

Sadr, Elahe, Women’s Rights Activist

Sadrzadeh, Ali, Journalist

Sanati, Mahdokht, Advocates of Children’s Rights

Setoudeh, Behrouz, Civil Rights Activist

Shafii, Rouhi, writer/translator and women’s rights activist

Shambayati, Karim, Human Rights Activist, Germany

Shariatmadari, Hassan, Haman Rights Activist

Shojaee, Mansoureh, Women’s rights activist

Soopikian, Carmen, Striving for Human Rights in Iran

Stratton, Katherine, Human Rights Advocate

Tabari, Esfandiar, Ph.D., Philosopher and Writer

Tabe-Mohammadi, Shahram, Ph.D., Ontario Ministry of Environment

Taheri, Fara, Women’s Rights activist

Talattof, Kamran, Ph.D., University of Arizona

Tohidi, Nayereh, Ph.D., California State University, Northridge

Vahdat, Farzin, Ph.D., Independent Scholar

Waladan, Jawad, Translator

Zamani, Lili, International Association of Women

Zamini, Sholeh, Women rights defender

Zandian, Mandana, MD, Poet, writer, Human Rights Activist

Zanganeh, Hamid, Ph.D., Widener University, Pennsylvania

Ziazie, Arsalan. Human Rights Advocate