IWAC – Said Seif Ali, born in 1984, an agricultural engineering graduate and managing editor of “Dideban-eh Iran” news website, founded in 2015; he was arrested upon attendance in the Persecution Office over “case follow-up” and transferred to an unknown location on Apr. 11, 2023. His wife, Assal Esmailzadeh, herself a news photographer and media activist, gave an interview to Shargh Newspaper [a reformist newspaper based in Iran], along with on her own Tweeter account, confirming the news of his arrest, adding she had no update on the arresting organization or the place of detention.” Another journalist, Milad Alavi, has announced about this arrest that “the latest update has been 10:30 the same day, when he said “I have to power my phone off” and since that time, there has been no update on the place of detention or his charges.” This was not his only arrest in recent times and before this, in the course of Zhina (Mahsa) Movement, he was arrested after subpoenaed to the Evin Persecution Office for eight days, on Jan. 7, 2023, and was temporarily released afterward on an unusually heavy sum of bail. Based on the statistics produced by the Association of Tehran Journalists, more than 57 journalists and news photographers had been arrested since the outbreak of mass protests in Iran. Before this, too, IFJ general secretary, Anthony Bellanger, had demanded the immediate release of all the Iranian journalists in detention, requiring the Islamic regime officials not to impede the free circulation of information and stop arresting journalists. “It is the absolute right of the Iranians to know what is going on in their country,” he adds.
