Reporters Without Borders condemns the arrest of Hassan
Nobakhtian, the editor of the conservative website Nosazi, who was put
in Evin prison on the orders of Tehran prosecutor-general Said
Mortazavi yesterday, 11 days after Mortazavi banned his website.
“This arrest was arbitrary and irregular,” the press freedom
organisation said. “No complaint had been brought against Nobakhtian.
The authorities are cracking down harder on the Internet in the run-up
to the 14 March parliamentary elections but, paradoxically, it is not
always the sites that are most critical of the government that are
banned.”
Reporters Without Borders added: “Conservative websites
that support President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad usually enjoy a degree of
immunity, and the blocking of Nosazi is indicative of the level of
tension between the different conservative factions as the elections
get nearer.”
Nosazi was critical of the reformist policies and
mocked comments made about the parliamentary elections by the young
mullah Hassan Khomeini, the grandson of the late Supreme Guide,
Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini ( http://www.rsf.org/article.php3?id_article=25762
). As well as Nosazi, four other websites were blocked including a site
edited by Fatemeh Rajabi, the wife of the government spokesman. The
authorities said they were “poisoning the electoral environment.”
