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January 30, 2012
January 30, 2012
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Iran — Shocking Escalation of Arrests and Human Rights Violations

Arseh Sevom- The end of January 2012 witnessed a further escalation in human rights violations in Iran. The ongoing repression continued with the arrest of two journalists, both women: Parastoo Dokoohaki and Marzieh Rasooli. The arrests of Mohammad Solimaninya, a website administrator and owner of Social Network for Iranian Professionals (www.u24.ir) that hosts and designs a number of civil society websites, ten Sunni Muslims in Ahwaz, as well as the shocking confirmation of the death sentence for Iranian-Canadian Saeed Malekopour, are just a few examples of the human rights situation in Iran in January alone.
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January 23, 2012
January 23, 2012
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“Wherever We Gather is The House of Cinema”

For the past 32 years there has been a complex relationship between the Iranian cinema industry and the Islamic republic. The ideologues of the Islamic revolution of 1979 sought justice and independence, dismissing the Shah as the figurehead of the status quo and opposing the West. The dawn of 1979 revolution started out with the mass persecution of actors, actresses, singers, musicians, dancers and other Iranian media figures. They were accused of having acted as accomplices of the former regime in propagating Western values – hence ‘westoxification’.
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January 19, 2012
January 19, 2012
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Why Did Arseh Sevom Join in the Internet Strike Yesterday?

Here's why... We joined because if passed, the law to protect intellectual property would have all sorts of debilitating and unintended consequences for people using the internet all over the world.Those include:
  • The closure of social networking sites with links to content owned by the entertainment industry: this could include Twitter, Tumbler, and even Facebook.
  • Precedent setting censorship laws that could (would) spread around the world.
  • And more...
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January 12, 2012
January 12, 2012
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JAN — Asghar Farhadi Protests Decision to Dissolve House of Cinema

Asghar Farhadi, the director of the award winning film, Separation of Nader from Simin wrote a letter to the Ministry of Culture calling for a vote on the decision to dissolve the House of Cinema in Iran. The letter stated: “If the decision to dissolve the House of Cinema is based on the idea that the majority of the film community and members of the guild are in agreement with your method, then I suggest that you take a vote on this decision among the few thousand members of the House of Cinema.”More info here.
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January 5, 2012
January 5, 2012
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How do you sanitize the Internet?

Board member Fred Petrossians, writing for Global Voices discusses rumors and plans for total control of the internet by the Iranian state:
Iranian authorities see the internet as a real battleground and consider citizen media and social networking as tools of “soft war”. Over several years they claim to have blocked and filtered millions of websites and blogs. Now several bloggers have reported that Iran's Corporate Computer Systems say the goal is for Iran to be entirely cut off from the World Wide Web once the country launches its own national internet network.
(More here...)
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January 5, 2012
January 5, 2012
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Urge Iran’s Parliament to Reject Anti-Human Rights Penal Code

Arseh Sevom and United4Iran urge you to send letters protesting discriminatory laws. Click here to join the campaign.The UN Secretary General, the UN Special Rapporteur on the Situation of Human Rights in Iran, the UN General Assembly, and the UN Human Rights Council have repeatedly called on Iran to revise its penal code to adhere to international human rights standards. In February 2010, the Iranian government accepted specific recommendations made under its Universal Periodic Review to ensure that its laws were in conformity with the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR) to which it is a party.Nonetheless, today, Iran’s parliament is preparing to pass the “Islamic Penal Bill” - legislation that flouts its legal obligations under the ICCPR. The legislation endangers free expression and reinforces laws that violate the rights of Iranian citizens. The bill fails to prohibit stoning, lashing, and other cruel, inhumane, and degrading punishments; redress discriminatory laws; or, raise the age of majority for girls and boys. In a particularly worrisome clause, the bill expands punishment for “actions against national security”, a charge that has routinely been used to persecute dissidents.
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