BOARD OF DIRECTORSArnold Amber
The Newspaper Guild
President
Mori Abdolalian
CJFE Journalists in Exile
Alison Armstrong
Journalist/writer
Bob Carty
CBC-Radio "The Sunday Edition"
Havoc Franklin
CBC Radio
Peter Jacobsen
Bersenas Jacobsen Chouest Thomson Blackburn LLP
Alice Klein
Now Magazine
Donald Livingstone
Promeus
Anita Mielewczyk
Journalist/Law Student
John Norris
Criminal Law Lawyer
Sharda Prashad
Canadian Business
Mary Deanne Shears
Journalist
Kelly Toughill
King's College School of Journalism
Anna Maria Tremonti
CBC Radio "The Current"
Philip Tunley
Lawyer, Stockwoods LLP
ADVISORY BOARDPeter Desbarats
Maclean-Hunter Chair for Communications Ethics, Ryerson
Parker Barss Donham
freelance
John Honderich
The Toronto Star
John Macfarlane
Toronto Life
Joe Matyas
Southern Ontario Newspaper Guild
Ann Medina
freelance
Rick Moffat
Radio-TV News Directors Assn.
Lynda Powless
Native Journalists' Association
Lloyd Robertson
CTV News
Robert Scully
Télémision Information Inc.
Julian Sher
Canadian Association of Journalists
Keith Spicer
Institut du Monde anglophone Université de Paris III Sorbonne nouvelle
Norman Webster
Montreal
Media Release
IRAN: 100 prominent journalists call for release of Maziar Bahari
Toronto, July 15, 2009-More than 100 prominent journalists from 47 countries sent a petition to the Iranian government today calling for the immediate release of Canadian journalist Maziar Bahari, Newsweek's Tehran correspondent, who has been held without charge in an Iranian jail since June 21.
"Journalists from around the world are showing solidarity with their colleague Maziar Bahari," said CJFE Executive Director Annie Game. "Canadians have already tragically lost one colleague in Iran (Zahra Kazemi, Evin prison, 2003) so we are heartened that the international community of journalists is standing together to call for Bahari's release from prison."
The petition was delivered today via fax to the Islamic Republic of Iran's justice minister, Mahmoud Hashemi Shahroudi, in Tehran. Canadian journalists including Peter Mansbridge, Lloyd Robertson, Sally Armstrong, Tony Burman, John Stackhouse and John Cruickshank added their signatures to the petition along with other respected international journalists such as Christiane Amanpour, Mariane Pearl, Ali Bulaç, Ahmed Rashid and Jiang Weiping. The petition urges the justice minister to intervene in Bahari's case and see that he is released immediately and allowed to return to work.
Maziar Bahari, a renowned reporter and filmmaker, was detained in late June along with at least 23 other local and international journalists amid post-election protests. On June 30, Fars News agency posted an 11-page "confession" from Bahari in which he allegedly blames Western media groups for the unrest that followed the election.
The petition was compiled by three international press freedom groups: CPJ, Index on Censorship, and Canadian Journalists for Free Expression.
For the full version of the petition, please click here.
Canadian Journalists for Free Expression (CJFE) is an association of more than 300 journalists, editors, publishers, producers, students and others who work to promote and defend free expression and press freedom in Canada and abroad.
For more information, contact CJFE Manager, Julie Payne at (416) 515-9622 x. 226