The Franco-Iranian Fariba Adelkhah was imprisoned again in Tehran (Iran), after being placed under house arrest in 2020. Iranian justice claims to have taken this decision because the researcher “deliberately violated the limits set on his house arrest dozens of times“, according to a press release published January 16. Fariba Adelkhah, aged 62, had to wear an electronic bracelet, with movement limited within a radius of 300 meters.
Deputy head of the judiciary, Kazem Gharibabadi, says he regrets the researcher ignored “the repeated warnings of the judicial authorities“, in this text published by Mizan, the Iranian justice information agency.
The Fariba Adelkhah support committee denied these accusations. “She basically respected the limitations placed on her freedom of movement”, said Béatrice Hibou, CNRS research director. “The issue is not whether or not Fariba Adelkhah complied with the terms of her house arrest. The reality is that this house arrest, the five-year prison sentence and the very arrest by Fariba Adelkhah, on June 5, 2019, never had the slightest foundation and were all iniquitous and illegitimate acts”, added Béatrice Hibou.
Thursday, in Paris, a hundred people had already gathered to show their indignation and their support for Fariba Adelkhah, described as “scientific prisoner” in Iran. French President Emmanuel Macron then called the Iranian authorities’ decision “totally arbitrary”, claiming that “the whole of France” was “mobilized for [la] release” of the researcher. The day before, the French Ministry of Foreign Affairs had warned that his reincarceration would not “could only have negative consequences” on bilateral relations and “reduce trust” between the two countries.
Kazem Gharibabadi said on Sunday that these statements were “unfounded” and denounced the interference of foreign countries in the Iranian judicial system. “Fariba Adelkhah is a citizen of the Islamic Republic of Iran and we strongly condemn the intervention of other countries in the judicial process”, he said. Iran does not recognize dual nationality and treats those arrested as Iranian citizens.
A specialist in Shiite Islam and post-revolutionary Iran at the Paris Institute of Political Studies, she was arrested in June 2019 and then sentenced in May 2020 to five years in prison for undermining national security, this that his relatives have always fiercely contested. Several dual nationals and another French citizen, Benjamin Brière, are detained in Iran. In recent years, the Islamic Republic has carried out several exchanges of detainees with foreign countries.