arrest

French woman arrested in Tehran: “A pathetic diplomatic game”

Team Observers — Tue, 07 Jul 2009 17:15:04 +0200

Clotilde Reiss, a young French woman who taught French at the University of Isfahan, was stopped by the police in Tehran on July 1. A close friend of hers responds to accusations calling Reiss a spy.

Marina El Khoury graduated from the Institut d’Etudes Politique in Lille the same year as Clotilde Reiss. The 23-year-old Lebanese woman has set up a Facebook group asking for her friend’s release.

Coltilde was supposed to take a flight to Beirut last Thursday to see friends and visit my family. When she didn’t call on Thursday, we got worried. I called the French embassy in Tehran to ask what was going on, but they didn’t know.

I spoke to Clotilde’s father, who said that she had been able to speak to some French diplomats and seemed to be in good health. She speaks Farsi, which helps enormously with interrogators.

The accusations that she is a spy are ridiculous. Iranians authorities have said that she took photos and sent them abroad. Which isn’t true — we have never received photos from her. It seems that she simply forgot to delete the photos of some demonstrations that she had on her camera, and so they seized them at the airport.

The only thing she did was send emails to her family and friends during the demos. She wasn’t saying anything more than was already being talked about in the media. She was just reassuring us that she was all right.

All this is just nasty political scheming. They have already arrested Americans and Britons, they needed a French person as well. They are looking for ways to put pressure on. The foreign affairs ministry thought at first that they had sorted out the affair quietly themselves. But it didn’t work and that’s why they told the media about it.

Clotilde went to Iran to perfect her Farsi and because she loves the country, its culture and its people. After setting up the Facebook page, I’m now looking for other things I can organise to support her.

Arrested for a subversive T-shirt

Sophie Team Observers — Fri, 22 May 2009 17:45:18 +0200

You often see Western teenagers wearing Che Guevara T-shirts as a sign of rebellion. Guangzhou resident Liu Shihui decided to don a T-shirt with the motif "The Chinese Communist Party opposes one-party rule". But despite explaining that the phrase came from the government itself, Liu was detained by the police.

Is the crisis in Madagascar really over?

Sophie Team Observers — Thu, 30 Apr 2009 18:47:04 +0200

The arrest on Wednesday of the 'legal' prime minister. Posted on Sobika.

Since Andry Rajoelina took power last month, Madagascar is no longer front page news. The conflict, however, is not over and supporters of exiled president Marc Ravalomanana continue to demonstrate. One of our Observers there tells us how the government is trying to put a stop to the movement.

Ousted president Marc Ravalomanana named, from his exile in Swaziland, a ‘legal' prime minister, Manandafy Rakotonirina. The latter set up his headquarters in one of the capital's best hotels and got ready to appoint the government. He was arrested on Wednesday night, along with others from the Ravalomanana movement.

The measure was taken in the hope of discouraging the protest movement, which continues to foster the 'legalists' and battle against the forces of order.

Video posted on Topmada.

Killed for filming police brutality on his mobile

Julien — Tue, 15 Jan 2008 11:52:26 +0100

When Wei Wenhu saw police forces beating up protesting villagers in Tianmen (central China), he took out his mobile and filmed the scene. But when he was spotted and tried to run away, he found himself being chased by around 20 police officers.

He cried that he would delete the photos and even give the policemen his phone. But it didn't make any difference. Wenhu was brutally beaten and succumbed to his injuries in hospital the same day, 7 January. The incident has outraged bloggers, whose online respects to this ‘citizen journalist' increase daily. Under pressure, the authorities have decided to undertake an investigation into the blunder, and have even fired the head of the city's police force.

In a country where the media is largely government controlled and heavily censored, images of police brutality usually find their way into the public eye on the internet. Here, some of those videos that the authorities would rather they didn't find their way out.