Tag: Iran

PEN AMERICA APPLAUDS NOBEL PEACE PRIZE FOR WRITER AND HUMAN RIGHTS ACTIVIST NARGES MOHAMMADI

On By Malcolm R. CampbellIn authors, writing

Nobel Committee recognizes the immense courage and dedication of PEN America Honoree Narges Mohammadi and all the writers and cultural workers like her in Iran

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

October 6, 2023

(NEW YORK)— The Nobel Peace Prize awarded today to imprisoned Iranian writer, human rights activist, and 2023 PEN/Barbey Freedom to Write Award honoree Narges Mohammadi recognizes her singular courage in standing against government repression of women, writers, activists, intellectuals, and cultural figures who face unspeakable consequences for daring to speak out or write, PEN America said.

Narges Mohammadi

Commenting on the award, PEN America CEO Suzanne Nossel said, “The awarding of the Nobel Peace Prize to Iranian writer and activist Narges Mohammadi is a tribute to her courage and that of countless women and girls who have poured out into the streets of Iran and faced down one of the world’s most brutal and stubborn regimes, risking their lives to demand their rights. For those of us at PEN America, Narges is an inspiration and also a personal friend, a woman whose story of unyielding defiance at crushing personal costs awakens the righteous indignation within each of us. We applaud the Nobel Committee for putting the weight of its Prize behind the struggle of Narges and all Iranian women for their freedom to dress, behave, think, and write as they wish.”

“Narges’ indefatigable will to be heard, even from the darkest, coldest, and most isolated corners of an Iranian prison, is astounding. She championed change in Iran from her jail cell with a passion and bravery that can truly be described as heroic. As a witness to decades of atrocities, she has used her voice as a catalyst to awaken a new generation to understand that their words are one of humanity’s greatest tools. PEN America enthusiastically congratulates Narges Mohammadi and calls for her immediate release.”

PEN America honored Narges Mohammadi with the 2023 PEN/Barbey Freedom to Write Award, which her husband, Taghi Rahmani, accepted on her behalf at the PEN America Literary Gala in New York City in May. Conferred annually, the PEN/Barbey Freedom to Write Award recognizes writers who have been jailed for their expression. PEN America galvanized celebrities including John Mullaney, Colin Jost, Candice Bergen, Diane Sawyer, Alec Baldwin, Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie and others to rally to Mohammadi’s cause, drawing international media coverage and global recognition of her plight. Of the 53 jailed writers who have been honored with the PEN America Freedom to Write Award since its establishment in 1987, 46 have been released from prison within an average of about 18 months due in part to the global attention and pressure generated by PEN America’s recognition. This is not the first time PEN America’s Award has led directly to the conferral of a Nobel Peace Prize. PEN’s 2009 Freedom to Write honoree Liu Xiaobo, the President of the Independent Chinese PEN Center, was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 2010, the culmination of a campaign set in motion by PEN America.

Narges Mohammadi has been forced to make unimaginable sacrifices for her work, including currently serving multiple sentences totaling more than 10 years in Iran’s notorious Evin Prison, where she has been threatened, beaten, and kept in periods of solitary confinement, a practice she has termed ‘white torture’ in her books and writings. Additionally, it has been almost nine years since Mohammadi last saw her husband and two children, who are now in exile in France. And yet, despite these arduous circumstances, Mohammadi continues to defend human rights and speak out against authoritarianism from within prison, drawing attention both to ongoing political events and to abuses against her fellow prisoners. “They will put me in jail again,” she wrote in her book, White Torture. “But I will not stop campaigning until human rights and justice prevail in my country.”

Mohammadi’s case is among dozens of cases of writers and activists who have faced political repression in Iran in the last year alone. Starting in September 2022, the country was swept by a widespread protest movement in favor of democracy and women’s rights following the state’s killing of Mahsa (Jina) Amini. In response, the Iranian regime further cracked down on free speech and arrested thousands for their participation in, or support of, the demonstrations. Iran’s literary and creative communities continue to use writing, art, and music as vehicles to express political dissent, even in the face of the brutal government crackdown.

Today’s stunning Potpourri of stuff

On By Malcolm R. CampbellIn Life

In no particular order. . .

  • I listened to Trump’s speech this morning. It was more low key and measured than I expected. Having said that, I’ll probably wake up tomorrow and read that we bombed something in Iran. I hope we don’t.
  • I tend to agree with Melinda’s comment on yesterday’s post about writer weblogs. She thought people tended to visit after buying a little-known author’s book (or hearing about them) just to learn something more about them rather than to buy a book. I haven’t cancelled my website yet, but I did get rid of a pricey add-on that I really don’t need.
  • My ex-wife and I haven’t spoken (or written) for years, but we both hear about each other via our daughter. I learned yesterday that my ex-wife’s older brother died two days ago. I messaged my daughter that I was sorry to hear the news. That’s all I can do since leaving a message on his Facebook profile or any of his family members’ profiles would probably be seen as a very unwelcome intrusion. He was a great guy.
  • Homemade chilli is simmering in the Dutch oven. Maybe some of it will be around later in the week when the bad weather hits the Southeast. Right now, our low temps here in north Georgia are in the high 20s.
  • I’m currently reading and enjoying Dora Goss’ The Sinister Mystery of the Mesmerizing Girl. It’s the third in her Athena Club series. The club looks into mysteries and other weird stuff. Club members are reading the manuscript as it unfolds, so we frequently have comments and dissenting opinions about the way the story is being handled.
  • It’s been fun watching the special “Jeopardy” competition this week between three all-time winners. Even when we know the answers, the champs say them before we do.

—Malcolm

We do not need a war with Iran

On By Malcolm R. CampbellIn issues

“War with Iran would be disastrous and wholly unnecessary. Military and diplomatic leaders have warned it could bring costs, in both blood and treasure, greater than the wars with Iraq and Afghanistan combined. We now face a stark choice: continue down the current path, with its catastrophic consequences, or immediately de-escalate: walk back aggressive rhetoric, end the cycle of military retaliation, and engage meaningfully in a diplomatic process for peace.

Source: Statement: We Must Pull Back From the Brink of War | Win Without War

We have been promised that the U.S. will withdraw its troops from Iraq (and the surrounding area) and Afghanistan. And yet, we just can’t seem to do it.

As Marianne Williamson said recently, “The killing of Soleimani is extremely serious, and will almost certainly cause a significant reaction from Iran. It’s not that Soleimani was a good man; he was not. But that’s not what this is about. It’s about the wise versus unwise, responsible versus irresponsible use of military power.”

Unfortunately, the hawks in Congress keep re-authorizing the horrible National Defense Authorization Act which gives the President broad powers to take action purportedly in the nation’s defense without a specific act or resolution from Congress. Supposedly, killing Soleimani saved American lives from actions he was planning.

However, if we weren’t there, Soleimani’s throughout the region wouldn’t be a threat to American lives. Now more troops are headed to the Middle East to shore up a presence we don’t need.

I look forward to the day when the American public says it’s had enough.

–Malcolm

 

 

 

What’s Your Iran Policy?

On By Malcolm R. CampbellIn news, News and Issues2 Comments

“News is a necessity in a democracy, for only those who understand the nature of their world can comprehend the perils and hazards facing them and thus survive the struggle. Men who enjoy a free and open encounter with vital ideas and issues, facts and problems of their epoch can best map their future.” Campbell and Wolseley in “How to Report and Write the News.”

“With Neda’s death, the Iran I know finally has a face. The sequence of her death is the sequence of our nation’s struggle in the past 30 years: The democratic future that 1979 was to deliver collapsing, then trails of blood — that of so many executed or assassinated — streaming across its bright promise. The film of Neda’s death is the abbreviated history of contemporary Iran.” — Roya Hakakian in “Commentary: Pray for Neda”

As you watch the protests in Iran on television and read about the importance of Twitter in spreading vital news to those who are otherwise denied access to information, have you formed an opinion about what must be done and developed a policy?

Most often, we are shown only one side of the coin in Iran, and that is of a rogue nation figuratively in bed with North Korea and a long list of other regimes portrayed–and often hunted–like junk yard dogs.

We read of the nuclear threat, of “honor killings,” of rule by divine right, of repression and torture supposedly justified by divine concurrence.

We are busy people, plugged into each others daily lives via Twitter, Facebook, and cell phones, so time and space for Iran on our daily radar scopes is, indeed, quite limited. Perhaps a fleeting glimpse the Ayatollah’s face as we last saw it in a news photograph or a political cartoon, perhaps an image of a nuclear holocaust with stock images out of one of the “Terminator” movies, perhaps an image of protesters marching in the streets.

Understandably, it’s easy for these images to become lost in the great clamor of background noise that is, by the grace of God and circumstance, far away. Even so, you probably have an opinion about it and, perhaps, what our government’s policy ought to be. But your policy, has it reached the drawing board yet?

Some say the U.S. and Israel should, on one pretext or another–whether out of rationalization or a true clear and present danger–attack. Others see this view as absurd.

What then?

Lately, some voices suggested that the U.S. should take care in its statements about Iran’s invalidation of the election and its harsh treatment of the protesters lest the Ayotolla find sufficient “evidence” in our statements to “prove” the protests are being orchestrated by Washington.

In her “Commentary: Pray for Neda,” Hakakian writes that during her first cab ride in the U.S., the driver asked her where she was from. When she said she was from Iran, the driver responded “Eeran … Khomeini?” and then moved his hand across his throat in a knife-slitting gesture.

Hakakian concluded that from this that “2,500 years of civilization was reduced to one vile name and the invocation of a throat being slit. It did not take long for me to learn that between the Iran that I knew and the Iran that Americans knew was a discrepancy as vast as the waters that separated us.”

It’s likely, given our lack of daily attention–especially when Iran is overtly quiet–that our opinion of Iran is similar to that of the cab driver.

And, if we are not among those urging our government to attack, what then is our opinion about our government’s alternatives. Is it “hands off”? Is it “out of sight and out of mind”? Is it wait until “they kill each other anyway”?

In the dedication of her memoir “Escape from the Land of No,” Hakakian writes:

“Between 1982 and 1990 an unknown number of Iranian women political prisoners were raped on the eve of their executions by guards who alleged that killing a virgin was a sin in Islam.
This book is dedicated to the memory of those women.”

From an Iran as a rogue nation perspective, it’s easy to see how you might see the guards full-frame in fron of your face and regard them as vile men who should be shot.

However, Neda’s death and the impact the video of her last moments is having throughout the world represents a potential defining moment in my consciousness and, I suspect, your consciousness as well. The video shows us Neda, NOT the man who shot her. You can see, as I can see, the victim at the other end of the repression, at the bullet’s destination and her eyes are like my daughter’s eyes and perhaps your daughter’s eyes.

Those eyes are an invitation and an opportunity to acknowledge with love and compassion the women the guards raped and executed rather than focusing a powerless hatred upon the guards–or upon the Ayatolla and his like-minded clerics and his soldiers.

May I suggest that while the actions of the Iranian repressors are news, they are not the entire story, and that newspaper headlines and television images that focus only on the rulers at the expense of the victims represent dishonest journalism? How many thousand people, victims with eyes as haunting as Neda’s eyes, do you suppose have gone unseen since the Ayatolla came to power?

Like that cab driver, it has been very easy for us to sweep the oppressed beneath the rug with the rogue nation label on it.

What is your Iran policy today?

Can you look into Neda’s eyes and say, “I love you and your brothers and sisters without condition and count you amongst my extended family?” If so, you will no longer feel the powerless hatred that arises from only staring at the Ayatolla’s image and from only despising the actions of the prison guards. Instead you will see that out of compassion and love, your actions will change and you will become part of a groundswell of news that flows around the world focusing on the struggles and needs and humanity of the Iranian people rather than upon the words and deeds and inhumanity of their regime.

Should the protests be silenced and the headlines fade away, you won’t forget Neda’s eyes will you? You will continue to love her, won’t you, and see to it that you are never silent about the news stories that still need to be told. I hope that will be your policy about Iran.

Copyright (c) 2009 by Malcolm R. Campbell, author of “The Sun Singer” and the upcoming “Jock Stewart and the Missing Sea of Fire.” (This post from my Writer’s Notebook)