Britain’s three major freedom of expression groups, Index on Censorship, English PEN, and Article 19, have come together to express their concern to the Iranian government via this open letter to the Iranian ambassador in London:

ARTICLE 19, English PEN and Index on Censorship call for the immediate
release of three US-Iranian citizens, charged by the Iranian
authorities with ‘acting against national security by engaging in propaganda
against the Islamic republic by the method of spying on behalf of foreigners.’

The accused are Kian Tajbakhsh, a social scientist at the New School in
New York who has worked as a consultant for the Open Society Institute
and the World Bank; Haleh Esfandiari, director of the Middle East
programme at the Washington-based Woodrow Wilson International Center
for Scholars; and Ali Shakeri, a founding board member of the
University of California, Irvine, Center for Citizen Peacebuilding.

ARTICLE 19, Index on Censorship and English PEN are alarmed by the
deterioration of the protection of the right to freedom of expression
in Iran, and in particular by the repeated attempts by the Iranian
authorities to isolate the Iranian media and academic community from
its global counterparts, and curtail cross-cultural dialogues and debates,
with the view of maintaining tight control over information, ideas, and
opinions. Dual nationals American-Iranians have been particularly
targeted, and their basic right to a fair trial denied.

We are gravely concerned that Tajbakhsh, Esfandiari and Shakeri have
been charged in violation of their right to freedom of expression, as
outlined in the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights,
to which Iran is a signatory, and call for their immediate and unconditional release.

Yours sincerely

Dr Agnes Callamard
Executive Director, ARTICLE 19
Global Campaign for Free Expression

Jonathan Heawood
Director, English PEN

Jo Glanville,
Editor, Index on Censorship

The following letter was published in the Irish Times on Monday:

Jailing of Iranian academic

We, the undersigned Irish academics, are writing to express
our concern at the arrest and incarceration of our fellow scholar, the
Iranian social scientist Dr Kian Tajbakhsh.

He was taken from his home in Tehran on May 11th and has been held
without access to legal counsel ever since.
We view the so-called “war on terror” as fundamentally unjust and
misconceived, and can understand the misgivings it has generated among
governments in the Middle East. Nonetheless, it must not be used as the
pretext for an assault on intellectuals in Iran.

Dr Tajbakhsh is a highly regarded sociologist and urban planner, whose
first book, The Promise of the City: Space, Identity, and Politics in
Contemporary Social Thought (2001: University of California Press), has
been seen as a notable contribution to urban social theory. His
subsequent work in Iran - on public health, humanitarian relief and local
government - has helped deflate Western misconceptions about processes
within the Islamic Republic, and points to the vibrancy of grassroots
Iranian society.

He is one of those rare members of the Iranian diaspora who has chosen
to return to Iran to live permanently there, giving up a secure place
in the American academic establishment in order to do so. In deciding to
base his scholarly activities in Tehran and to raise a family there, he
literally lives out his commitment to Iran.

Given his intellectual labours on behalf of Iran, and his personal
commitment to Iran, we are appalled that he has been jailed on charges of
espionage. We protest against the slander and hardship to which he is
being subjected, and call upon the Iranian government to release Dr
Tajbakhsh immediately.

- Yours, etc,

Dr JOE CLEARY, Senior Lecturer in English
Dr STEVE COLEMAN, Lecturer in Anthropology
Dr COLIN COULTER, Senior Lecturer in Sociology
Dr LAURENCE COX, Lecturer in Sociology
Dr HONOR FAGAN, Senior Lecturer in Sociology
Dr CHANDANA MATHUR, Lecturer in Anthropology
Dr SEAMAS O’SIOCHAIN, Senior Lecturer in Anthropology
Prof LAWRENCE TAYLOR, Head of the Department of Anthropology
Dr GAVAN TITLEY, Director of Media Studies, NUI Maynooth
Dr ANDREW FINLAY, Lecturer in Sociology
Dr HILARY TOVEY, Head of the Department of Sociology, Trinity College Dublin
Prof TADHG FOLEY, Chairman, Centre for Irish Studies
Dr SU-MING KHOO, Lecturer in Sociology, NUI
GalwayDr HEATHER LAIRD, Lecturer in English
Prof JOSEPH RUANE, Associate Professor of Sociology, University College Cork
Prof RONALDO MUNCK, President’s Office, Dublin City University
Dr MIKE TOMLINSON, Head of School of Sociology, Social Policy and Social Work, Queen’s University Belfast.

This is a letter from academics, intellectuals, writers, and activists from the Arab world in the fields of human rights, education, culture, and environment:

Kian Tajbakhsh’s detention is a flagrant and unjust violation of the freedom, security and safety of a researcher and an academic who has consistently worked to help the Iranian government develop its services in urban planning and local government. His detention also presents an image of Iran to the region and the rest of the world as a regime that persecutes innocent people, using them as pawns in its international political struggle, and fabricating charges against them to soil their reputation and restrict their liberty. The arrests of Kian and the other Iranian academics, especially those who hold dual American and Iranian citizenship, is nothing but an attempt to exert pressure on the administration of George Bush. His administration, which has occupied Iraq and Afghanistan and has provided unprecedented aid to Israel, is unlikely to be concerned about the arrest of a small group of intellectuals who generally come from a liberal background and are opposed to the war against terror, even though they are American nationals.

We ask the Iranian authorities, who have once held up the slogans of freedom and justice, and who may yet recall the repression and despotism practiced by the Shah’s regime against the Iranian people, to release Kian Tajbakhsh and drop all the false charges made against him.

This letter is also addressed to all those concerned with academic and scientific freedom in the Arab world, and we invite them to act in solidarity with Kian Tajbakhsh by signing this letter demanding his release, and circulating it as widely as possible.For more information on Kian, his arrest and detention, and the ongoing campaigns in his support, we ask you to visit the website www.freekian.org.

Basma el-Husseiny, Egypt
Hossam Bahgat, Egyptian Initiative for Personal rights, Egypt
Christine Tohme, Lebanon
Ola Khaldi, Jordan
Moataz el-Fegeiry, Cairo Institute for Human Rights Studies, Egypt
Gamal Eid, Arab Human Rights Information Network, Egypt
Azza Soliman, Center for Women’s Legal Assistance, Egypt
Wessam Ahmed, Al-Haq, Palestine
Bahey Edin Hassan, Cairo Institute for Human Rights Studies, Egypt
Mustafa Kamel Al-Sayyid, Professor of Political Science, Cairo University, Egypt
Nasser Amin, General Director, The Arab Center for the Independence of the Judiciary and the Legal Profession (ACIJLP), Egypt
Dr. Saad Eddin Ibrahim, Chairman, Ibn Khaldun Center for Development Studies, Egypt
Heba Saleh, Correspondent, BBC Cairo, Egypt
Dr. Nadia El-Sayed El-Shazly, Egypt

VIGIL TO SUPPORT HUMAN RIGHTS IN IRAN AND TO CALL FOR THE IMMEDIATE RELEASE OF DETAINED IRANIAN-AMERICANS

In May the government of Iran arrested four Iranian-Americans: prominent U.S. scholars Haleh Esfandiari and Kian Tajbakhsh, journalist Parnaz Azima and activist Ali Shakeri. Esfandiari, Tajbakhsh and Shakeri remain in detention without being able to see family, lawyers, or the ICRC. All four face serious charges stemming from their efforts to promote an Iranian-American dialogue and scholarly work and could be sentenced to long prison terms. JOIN AMNESTY INTERNATIONAL, THE AMERICAN ISLAMIC CONGRESS AND HUMAN RIGHTS WATCH AS WE CALL FOR THE RELEASE AND DROPPING OF UNFOUNDED CHARGES AGAINST THE DETAINED IRANIAN-AMERICANS

SPEAKERS TO INCLUDE SHAUL BAKHASH, HUSBAND OF HALEH ESFANDIARI, AND ZAINAB AL-SUWAIJ OF THE AMERICAN ISLAMIC CONGRESS

WHERE:

Dag Hammarskjold Plaza at 1st Avenue and 47nd Street, across from the United Nations Plaza

WHEN: Wednesday June 27, 12 noon to 1 pm

Feel free to bring signs calling for freedom for the detained activists. This is to be a non-political and non-partisan action advocating human rights

For more information, contact Sharon McCarter, 202-691-4016
or Amnesty International USA, 202-675-8755

More than 3,000 people have signed the petition for Kian’s release so far.  Thank you so much for your support–it is very heartening to all of us who are campaigning on his behalf.  Please continue to raise awareness about Kian’s case and those of the other scholars and journalists detained in Iran.

Academics, intellectuals, journalists, artists, and religious leaders in India–where Kian lived for several years–are campaigning for his release. Many have signed a petition on his behalf, which was delivered to the Iranian embassy in Delhi this week.  An article today in The Hindu describes their efforts:

Prominent artists, intellectuals, public figures urge release of Iranian scholar

NEW DELHI: More than 150 prominent Indian artists, intellectuals and public figures have written to the Iranian authorities seeking immediate release of jailed scholar Kian Tajbakhsh.

Arrested on May 11, Dr. Tajbakhsh is one of the four Iranians with dual American nationality who have been charged with working to undermine the government of the Islamic Republic of Iran.

He lived in India in the 1990s and is well known in academic and cultural circles here.

In the letter, which was handed over to Iranian Charge d’Affaires Reza Alaei on Thursday, the signatories expressed deep concern at the incarceration of Dr. Tajbakhsh. While recognising Iran’s “sovereign right to secure itself against any perceived threat to its welfare and safety,” they described the imprisoned scholar as a “man of integrity and an Iranian patriot incapable of indulging in `espionage’ against his country.”

India, the letter notes, is a friend of the Islamic Republic of Iran.

“Those of us from India — academics, artists, intellectuals, journalists, professionals and the most respected Shia leaders — calling upon your Government to release Dr. Tajbakhsh are all friends of Iran and of the Iranian people. Many of us have taken public stand against the American-led `global war on terror’ and against its hegemonic agenda of `regime change’ in Iran or elsewhere,” it says.

The signatories include Shia cleric Maulana Kalbe Sadiq; writers Khushwant Singh, Arundhati Roy, Dilip Chitre and Gulzar; journalists Saeed Naqvi, Tarun Tejpal, Farah Naqvi, Siddharth Varadarajan and Praful Bidwai; artists Tyeb Mehta and Jehangir Sabavala; filmmakers Saeed Mirza and Govind Nihalani and academics Achin Vanaik, Nivedita Menon and Anuradha Chenoy.

“Whatever be the nature of the questioning that Dr. Tajbakhsh must undergo, surely it can happen outside the prison walls,” the letter states.

“We take this occasion to make a personal plea to your Government on humanitarian grounds. Dr. Tajbakhsh and his wife are expecting their first child a few months from now. The stress and strain of his imprisonment can only harm the health of both mother and child,” it adds.

Today marks the fifth week since Kian’s arrest on Friday 11 May.  He has still not seen a lawyer.   Recent press reports suggest that the Iranian judiciary will soon announce whether to indict or release the Iranian-American detainees held in Evin Prison or prevented from leaving the country.  The charges against Kian and the others are completely unfounded, and we call on the Iranian government to free them immediately.

We have been informed of an online campaign on behalf of Mehrnoushe Solouki, a French-Iranian filmmaker who has been prevented from leaving Iran.  According to the Free Solouki website,

Mehrnoushe Solouki is an independant filmmaker with dual citizenship (France and Iran) and a resident of Canada, where she is pursuing her PhD. She was arrested in Tehran on 19 February 2007, detained in unacceptable conditions at the Evin prison for a month, then released on 20 March 2007. The authorities have confiscated her video camera, her computer and her video cassettes. The government of Iran accuses her “endangering national security” and are preventing her from leaving Iran.

Please go and sign the petition on her behalf. The Free Kian Campaign supports the release of all those wrongly detained by the Iranian authorities.

Article 19, the Global Campaign for Free Expression, has launched an appeal on behalf of the Iranian-Americans detained in Iran.  The full appeal text can be seen here (PDF).  According to the press release:

ARTICLE 19 calls for the immediate release of three U.S.-Iranian citizens charged by the Iranian authorities with “acting against national security by engaging in propaganda against the Islamic republic by the method of spying on behalf of foreigners”, and urges its partners, contacts and supporters to sign on to the petitions to free Dr. Kian Tajbakhsh, Haleh Esfandiari and Ali Shakeri.

Parnaz (Nazi) Azima, journalist for Radio Farda, the Persian-language service run jointly by Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty and Voice of America has also been charged by the Iranian authorities with the same charges. Mrs Azima has recently been released on bail, but is still facing prosecution and the prospect of lengthy incarceration and possibly the death sentence if convicted of the national security charges.

The other accused are Kian Tajbakhsh, a social scientist at the New School in New York who has worked as a consultant for the Open Society Institute and the World Bank; Haleh Esfandiari, director of the Middle East programme at the Washington-based Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars; and Ali Shakeri, a founding board member of the University of California, Irvine, Center for Citizen Peacebuilding.

ARTICLE 19 is alarmed by the deterioration of the protection of the right to freedom of expression in Iran, and in particular by the repeated attempts by the Iranian authorities to isolate the Iranian media and academic community from its global counterparts, and curtail cross-cultural dialogues and debates, with the view of maintaining tight control over information, ideas, and opinions. Dual national American-Iranians have been particularly targeted, and their basic right to a fair trial denied.

The New York Resident has published this detailed profile of Kian, focusing on his life and work in New York and his decision to return to Iran:

In many ways, Kian Tajbakhsh was a quintessential New Yorker who loved eating sushi and browsing the aisles of the Strand bookstore. By night, the former New School professor would host musical gatherings in his Chelsea apartment and participate in seminars with his academic friends.

Tajbakhsh, 45, now languishes in Iran’s Evin prison – an infamous holding pen for political prisoners, where “white torture,” or solitary confinement, is reportedly employed to force confessions from inmates. He’s accused of spying and could face a three-year sentence, according to Human Rights Watch.

How Tajbakhsh got from Chelsea to Evin is the story of one man’s clash with Iran’s brutal police state. His fate could be the same as hundreds of other political prisoners who have been held for lengthy periods in Iran’s prison system. Tajbakhsh, some observers say, is being used as a pawn in Iran’s game of brinksmanship with the U.S. over its burgeoning nuclear program.

The irony is that Tajbakhsh, a dual citizen, often defended his native land. He told American friends that the Western press was too negative in its portrayals of Iran. As if to prove the point, Tajbakhsh moved to Tehran in late 2001. He had spent most of his life abroad, since his family emigrated to England when he was a teenager. After more than a decade in Manhattan, he longed to reconnect with his country of birth.
In Tehran, he settled into a life of teaching and consulting work. But around May 11, Tajbakhsh was whisked from his home and brought to Evin prison.

He has been held there ever since, beyond the reach of family members or a lawyer. He has only been allowed to communicate with his pregnant wife, Bahar, in one- or two-minute phone conversations, according to Nidhi Srinivas, a friend and former New School colleague, who’s been in touch with Tajbakhsh’s mother, an Upper West Side resident.

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The American Iranian Council has released this statement condemning the arrests of dual nationals:

The American Iranian Council protests, in strongest terms, the arrest of several Iranian-Americans by the Iranian Government, demands their immediate release, and asks that they be justly treated while in the Iranian Government’s custody. The arrestees include Dr. Haleh Esfandiary, Dr. Kian Tajbahksh, and Mr. Ali Shakeri, all individuals with unquestionable backgrounds. Whether these arrests are specifically designed to mirror US moves in Iraq against the Iranian diplomats, is a new right-wing approach to silencing the voices of democratic activists and facilitators, or founded upon perceived or misunderstood activities by the arrestees, their negative and corrosive effects upon the US-Iranian relationship and on the Iranian-American community should not be ignored. The US-Iranian “spiral conflict” is fed by moves such as this and the Council believes that both sides must work hard not only to avoid such moves but to act in ways which are positive and productive.

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Several senior international public health experts in the field of HIV/AIDS prevention and harm reduction have released the following letter to the Iranian authorities on Kian’s arrest:

We write to express our grave concern about the arrest of Dr. Kian Tajbakhsh, a noted scholar and expert who has worked with international organizations including the Open Society Institute and the World Bank, as well as Iranian government ministries.

Dr. Tajbakhsh’s work included efforts to ensure that injection drug users gained access to HIV prevention, as well as assistance in monitoring rebuilding efforts in the city of Bam after it was decimated by an earthquake in 2003. These are humanitarian efforts in service of the Iranian people. We are dismayed by the baseless charges against Dr. Tajbakhsh.

Iran’s efforts to reduce HIV spread among drug users through services such as needle exchange and provision of methadone have been impressive. Dr. Tajbakhsh’s imprisonment, however, casts a shadow over these achievements. We urge you to effect Dr. Tajbakhsh’s immediate release.

Prof. Michel Kazatchkine, M.D.
Executive Director
Global Fund to fight AIDS, TB and Malaria

Mathilde Krim, Ph.D.
Founding Chairman, AmFar
The Foundation for AIDS Research

Prof. Adeeba Kamarulzaman, MD
Head of Infectious Diseases,
University of Malaya

Chris Beyrer, Ph.D.
Director, Johns Hopkins Fogarty AIDS International Training and Research Program and Professor of Epidemiology, International Health, and Health Behavior and Society
Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health

Martin Jelsma,
Coordinator
Drugs & Democracy Programme
Transnational Institute

Syed Mohammed Ali has an op-ed piece in the Daily Times of Pakistan about the Kian and the other detainees and US-Iran relations.  It reads in part:

Iran has arrested four prominent American Iranian citizens during the past month. Those arrested by Iranian intelligence agencies include Haleh Esfandiari, the Middle East programme head at the Woodrow Wilson International Centre for Scholars. Dr Esfandiari was detained while she was visiting her sick mother in Iran. Her book, ‘Reconstructed Lives: Women and Iran’s Islamic Revolution’, which shows how the revolution impacted lives of women and how a few of them have been challenging the regime, is being cited as a proof of subversion by Iran’s Revolutionary Court. Besides Dr Esfandiari, Dr Kian Tajbakhsh was also arrested from his home in Tehran. Dr Kian Tajbakhsh taught urban studies at the New School in New York City before returning to a career in urban planning and academia back in his homeland. Dr Tajbakhsh has been working with several institutions including Iran’s own Municipalities and Social Security Organisations. He also served as an international research adviser for the Central European University’s International Policy Fellowships programme, funded by Open Society Institute. At the time of his arrest, Dr Tajbakhsh was preparing a regional workshop at the Lahore University of Management Sciences in Pakistan, to examine the prospects of devolving power as a means of improving the lives of ordinary people.

This recent detention of academics by the Iranian authorities dramatically illustrates just how insecure threatened governments can become, resorting to targeting individuals in the hope of using them as scapegoats against other nations. It is even possible that Iranian hardliners may have instigated these arrests as a means of creating a new diplomatic crisis to torpedo pragmatist efforts within the Iranian government itself.

Today marks the fourth full week that Kian has been in Evin Prison.  He was arrested on Friday May 11th.  He has still not seen a lawyer.

A group of Kian’s former colleagues from the New School have written a letter to the Iranian authorities on his behalf.  They delivered it today to the Iranian mission to the United Nations:

We write this letter as former colleagues of Dr. Kian Tajbakhsh at the Milano Graduate School of Management and Urban Policy at The New School in New York City, where he taught graduate and undergraduate courses for more than seven years. We are deeply concerned about Dr. Tajbakhsh’s imprisonment and the charges leveled against him. He is a scholar and teacher of the highest caliber and an individual of integrity.

The charges filed against Dr. Tajbakhsh run completely counter to his character and lifelong commitment as a researcher, scholar, teacher, and colleague. We urge you to drop the charges and release him from prison immediately.

Sincerely,

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University College London, where Kian earned a master’s degree in urban planning, has released a statement about his arrest, with a link to the Free Kian campaign.  The statement reads:

UCL statement: incarceration of Dr Kian Tajbakhsh
8 June 2007

UCL is deeply concerned by news of the arrest of one of its graduates, Dr Kian Tajbakhsh, who completed an MSc in Urban Planning (UCL Bartlett School) in 1984.

He was arrested at his home in Tehran by Iranian security services on 11 May 2007 and has been detained since then in Evin prison, without being granted legal representation.

Professor Malcolm Grant, President and Provost of UCL, said: “Dr Tajbakhsh is an internationally respected social scientist and urban planner. He earned a high reputation as an international expert in local government reform, urban planning, public health and social policy. Amongst some of the important work he has done is the evaluation of humanitarian relief and reconstruction projects in Iran in the aftermath of the 2003 earthquake in Bam.

“We at UCL are proud of Dr Tajbakhsh’s achievements. We urge the Iranian government to engage in formal legal process by granting him legal representation and providing evidence of the charges of which he is accused.”

To visit a website campaigning for the release of Dr Tajbakhsh, use the link at the top of the article.

The Free Kian Campaign now has a Farsi-language webpage here.  Please share the address with others.

In the current issue of The New York Review of Books there is a public letter calling for Haleh Esfandiari’s release, signed by over a hundred prominent intellectuals, writers, and Middle East experts.  Because Kian’s case did not become public until after Haleh’s, his name was not included in this appeal, but in the same issue the NYRB published the following letter from Aryeh Neier, President of the Open Society Institute:

To the Editors:

On May 11, a few days after the detention in Tehran of Haleh Esfandiari (see the letter on page 8 of this issue, calling for her release), another Iranian-American scholar, Kian Tajbakhsh, was also detained. On May 29, Iran’s Ministry of Intelligence charged both with endangering Iranian national security and espionage. The charges have no merit.

Dr. Tajbakhsh is an urban planning and urban policy expert who received his Ph.D. from Columbia University in 1993 and taught at the New School in New York from 1994 to 2001. He has been a consultant for the Open Society Institute in Iran for the past three years, focusing on public health —particularly, treatment for Iran’s vast number of users of injected drugs—humanitarian assistance, and urban planning. Dr. Tajbakhsh has also served as a consultant for a Dutch urban planning group, for the World Bank, and for several Iranian government organizations.

We know little about Dr. Tajbakhsh’s treatment in detention. As I write, nearly three weeks after his arrest, he has not seen a lawyer or family members. Though he may make one-minute phone calls to his wife, what they say is obviously monitored and she is understandably reluctant to repeat what he says as the only thread that keeps them in contact could be cut easily.

In seeking the release of Dr. Tajbakhsh, the Open Society Institute is eager to see that his case does not heighten tensions between Iran and the West. That would undermine Dr. Tajbakhsh’s efforts to promote a peaceful resolution of differences by his engagement in scholarly and humanitarian projects that involve collaboration between Iranians and Westerners.

Aryeh Neier
President
Open Society Institute
New York City

The Centre for Peace and Development Initiatives in Pakistan (CPDI-Pakistan) has demanded Kian’s immediate release of Dr. Tajbakhsh, who has supervised the academic work of many International Policy Fellows in Pakistan, and is well known to colleagues in CPDI-Pakistan and other research and civil society organizations.

Kian was scheduled to visit Pakistan to participate in the regional IPF workshop on June 1-4 at the Lahore University of Management Sciences (LUMS) in Pakistan.  The workshop, which has now been cancelled due to his arrest, was entitled Devolution As Freedom? Devolving Power and Building Nations in Iran, Iraq, Afghanistan, and Pakistan.

The News-International of Islamabad has published a lengthy article about the response to Kian’s arrest among his colleagues in Pakistan and elsewhere.  It is not yet available in online form, but a JPEG image can be viewed here.

Kian serves as an academic advisor to the International Policy Fellowship Program of the Center for Policy Studies at Central European University. The program has released a statement to the press about his arrest:

We are issuing this statement to draw your attention to the arrest in Iran of respected American Iranian scholar Dr. Kian Tajbakhsh. On May 11, 2007, agents of the Iranian Intelligence Ministry arrested Dr. Tajbakhsh at his home in Tehran. Dr. Tajbakhsh is currently being detained in Tehran’s Evin Prison, without access to legal counsel. It is difficult to imagine why a brilliant scholar, advisor and friend like Dr. Tajbakhsh would be incarcerated. We strongly appeal for your help in revoking the decision to detain him.

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The website of the King’s School in Canterbury, England, where Kian attended secondary school, has put up a notice about his arrest and the campaign for his release.

 The American Sociological Association has sent a letter to the Iranian government expressing dismay at the charges against Kian and calling for his release.  The letter can be viewed in PDF format here.  It reads in part:

We are writing on behalf of the more than 14,000 members of the American Sociological Assocation (ASA), a scientific society of academic and professional sociologists, to request that Dr. Kian Tajbakhsh, a highly respected academic sociologist with dual citizenship in Iran and the United States, and who was arrested on May 11 by the Iranian government, be freed….We are profoundly dismayed by the arbitrary and secretive nature of Dr. Tajbakhsh’s arrest and the vague “espionage” charges against him.

The International Journal of Urban and Regional Research, a leading international scholarly journal for which Kian serves as a corresponding editor, has issued this letter on his behalf:

Dear Sirs,
We understand that agents of the Iranian Ministry of Information arrested Dr Kian Tajbakhsh at his home in Tehran on 11th May, that he is being detained without access to legal counsel in Tehran’s Evin prison.

As colleagues of Dr. Tajbakhsh from across the world, we call for his immediate and unconditional release.

Dr Tajbakhsh is a corresponding editor of the International Journal of Urban and Regional Research, a leading international journal in the study of cities and regions worldwide. Dr Tajbakhsh was invited to become a corresponding editor in recognition of his scholarship, international reputation and prominence within urban studies in Iran today. Dr Tajbakhsh is the author of The Promise of the City: Space, Identity and Politics in Contemporary Social Thought (University of California Press, 2001) as well as a volume in Persian, Social Capital: Trust, Democracy and Development (published in Iran in 2005). He taught at the New School in New York before returning to Iran. He has a well deserved reputation for reasoned and eloquent analysis.

Dr Tajbakhsh has played an important role on our journal, advising us on the quality of submissions from Iran and the ‘Middle East’, and assisting Iranian scholars to bring their research to the attention of the international community of scholars. In 2005, he co-edited a symposium in the journal on globalization and the city. This symposium has attracted considerable interest and attention world-wide. He plays important roles linking Iran to international scholarship in other respects also – including through the World Bank, the Social Science Research Council in the USA (for whom he served as a Steering Committee Member on their Middle East and North Africa Program).

Yours sincerely,

Jeremy Seekings
Co-editor, International Journal of Urban and Regional Research

On behalf of the editors, Editorial Board, former editors and Corresponding Editors of the International Journal of Urban and Regional Research:
Alan Harding (UK, co-editor)
Roger Keil (Germany/Canada, co-editor)
Jeremy Seekings (UK/South Africa/USA, co-editor)
Terry McBride (UK, managing editor)
AbdouMaliq Simone (USA, debates and development editor)
Talja Blokland (Netherlands, review editor)
Julie-Anne Boudreau (Belgium/Canada)
Neil Brenner (USA)
Maria Kaika (Greece/UK)
Takashi Machimura (Japan)
Marcus de Melo (Brazil)
Harvey Molotch (USA)
Simon Parker (UK)
Smriti Srinivas (India/USA)
Min Zhou (China/USA)
Judit Bodnar (Hungary)
Priscilla Connolly (Mexico)
Susan Fainstein (USA)
Marisol Garcia (Spain)
Michael Harloe (UK)
Dominique Joye (Switzerland)
Patrick Le Gales (France)
Margit Mayer (Germany)
Linda McDowell (UK)
Enzo Mingione (Italy)
Suhata Patel (India)
Chris Pickvance (UK)
Edmond Preteceille (France)
Tarık Şengül (Turkey)
Licia Valladares (Brazil/France)
John Walton (USA)

The board of the International Sociological Association’s Research Committee on the Sociology of Urban and Regional Development has sent the following letter to the Iranian authorities:

Dear Sirs:

As elected Steering Committee members of the Research Committee on the Sociology of Urban and Regional Development (RC21) of the International Sociological Association, we write to express our grave concern and dismay over the arrest and detention of Professor Kian Tajbakhsh. In addition to being a member in good standing of our association, Dr. Tajbakhsh is a respected and world-known scholar of cities in the developing world, having written widely on the theory and practice of urban development in the Middle East and elsewhere. He is a respected member of our collegium who has shown the highest integrity in work and professional relations. His commitment to scholarship, to bettering the quality of life in cities of the Middle East, and to promoting open dialogue and understanding among professional urbanists around the world have increased his stature in recent years. As an association that counts on a global membership from countries North and South, East and West, and as a community of scholars who relish the give-and-take among urbanists of all nationalities, races, ethnicities, and political persuasions, we are concerned about the international repercussions of Dr. Tajbkhsh’s arrest and its implications for future scholars who, like Kian, are committed to research and practice in cities of the world. We strongly urge you to reconsider your decisions to retain and charge him, and that in the interim he be given access to legal counsel, family members, and any necessary medical aid.

Sincerely,

Kuniko Fujita (Japan/USA), President
Fernando Diaz Orueta (Spain), Secretary
Yuri Kazepov (Italy), Vice-President

Board Members
Judith Bodnar (Hungary)
Tim Butler (UK)
Diane Davis (USA)
Jan Willem Duyvendak (Netherlands)
Kong Chong Ho (Singapore)
Ute Lehrer (Canada)
Takashi Machimura (Japan)
Thomas Maloutas (Greece)
Eduardo Marques (Brazil)
Ranvinder Singh Sandhu (India)

The London-based Arabic newspaper Al-Hayat recently published this column by Elias Harfouch on the situation in Iran:

 A ‘Velvet Revolution’ in Iran? 

1 June 2007

In line with what similar regimes do, Tehran could not find a better way to cut short voices within Iran than ‘uncovering’ a US spy network. These voices had expressed doubts about the dialogue that has begun in Baghdad with the ‘Great Satan’.

Thus, four Iranian citizens holding US citizenship were charged with working for the CIA. They were accused of planning a ‘velvet revolution’ - according to the Iranian version - that would eliminate the Islamic revolutionary regime, which has yet to lay roots down although its thirtieth year is just round the corner!

Could such a regime, established by Imam Khomeini, be so fragile that it is threatened by an academic activist, a journalist, a social scientist and a representative of a US non-governmental organization concerned with peace? Are the Iranian officials, who boast that they have ‘unlimited’ military capabilities according to a recent statement by President Ahmadinejad, so afraid of the activities of these four, even if we assume that they have a quality of espionage?

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