Abbas Amir-Entezam

Abbas Amir-Entezam (PerB| عباس امیر انتظام, born 1933) was the spokesman and Deputy Prime Minister in the Interim Cabinet of Mehdi Bazargan in 1979. In 1981 he was sentenced to life imprisonment on charges of spying for the U.S., a charge critics suggest was a cover for retaliation against his early opposition to theocratic government in Iran. He is now "the longest-held political prisoner in the Islamic Republic of Iran". [http://www.iranian.com/BTW/2004/December/Entezam/index.html Burning candle. Honoring Abbas Amir-Entezam on the 25th anniversary of his arrest. Masoud Kazemzadeh, December 21, 2004 ] ] According to Fariba Amini, as of 2006 he has "been in jail for 17 years and in and out of jail for the last ten years, altogether for 27 years." [ [http://www.payvand.com/news/06/feb/1191.html 02/24/06 Perseverance and honor: Interview with Abbas Amir-Entezam by Fariba Amini ] ]

Education and Career

Entezam was born to "a middle-class family" in Tehran in 1933. He studied Electromechanical Engineering at Faculty of Engineering, University of Tehran and graduated in 1955. Inspired by Mohammed Mosaddeq's fight with the British and his nationalization of the oil industry, Entezam volunteered to help Mossadeq's movement and at 22-years of age he was chosen to be the representative of the National Liberation Movement to initiate contact with the American diplomats at the US embassy.

In 1956 Entezam left Iran for study at the Sorbonne. He then went to the U.S. and completed his postgraduate education at the University of California in Berkeley. After graduation, he remained in the US and worked as an entrepreneur. [http://www.entezam.org/index.html The official web site of Mr. Entezam] click on Biography ]

Around 1970, Entezam mother was dying and he returned to Iran to be with her. Because of his earlier political activities, the Shah's Intelligence Service would not allow him to return to the U.S. He stayed in Iran, marrying, becoming a father and developing a business in partnership with his friend and mentor, Mehdi Bazargan. In 1979 the Shah was overthrown by the Iranian Revolution. Revolutionary leader Ayatollah Khomeini, recently returned to Iran, appointed Bazargan as Prime Minister of the Provisional Revolutionary Government. "Bazargan asks Entezam to be the Deputy Prime Minister and the official spokesperson for the new government."

According to Entezam's website:

Following the orders of the Prime Minister, Entezam sets out to rebuild the relationship between the US and the post-revolutionary Iran. He retains diplomatic contacts with the US embassy, advocating for normalization of the relationship between the two countries.

This was to later lead to imprisonment. In 1979 Amir-Entezam "succeeded in having the majority of the cabinet sign a letter opposing the Assembly of Experts", which was drawing up the new theocratic constitution where democratic bodies were subordinant to clerical bodies. His theocratic opponents attacked him and in August 1979 Bazargan "appointed Entezam to become Iran's ambassador to Sweden."

Imprisonment

In 1981, Sadegh Ghotbzadeh, the then Minister of Foreign Affairs, asked Entezam to come back quickly to Tehran via an encrypted message. After coming back to Tehran, he was arrested because of allegations based on some documents retrieved from U.S. embassy takeover, and received life time prison from court. He was released in 1998, but in less than 3 months, he was arrested again because of an interview with Tous daily newspaper, one of the reformist newspapers of the time.

In smuggled letters, Entezam has related that on three separate occasions, he had been taken blindfolded to the execution chamber - once being kept "there two full days while the Imam contemplated his death warrant." He has spent 555 days in solitary confinement, and in cells so "overcrowded that inmates took turns sleeping on the floor - each person rationed to thee hours of sleep every 24 hours." He suffered permanent ear damage, skin disease, and spinal deformities." [http://books.google.com/books?id=_mnrYNIVfCgC&pg=PA140&lpg=PA140&dq=%22islam+is+a+religion+of+care+compassion+and+forgiveness%22&source=web&ots=npY_9X4XAk&sig=GvbFWmM42gUbE_BtLTCEB092SHo Tortured Confessions: Prisons and Public Recantations in Modern Iran] by Ervand Abrahamian, University of California Press, 1999, p.140 ] He has attacked the regimes saying

Islam is a religion of care, compassion, and forgiveness. This regime makes it a religion of destruction, death, and torture.

As of 2008 and after more than 25 years, Amir-Entezam is still in prison. He has always denied all the allegations that have been put against him in his trial and asks for a retrial.

Awards and honors

* Bruno Kreisky Prize (1998)
* Jan Karski Award for Moral Courage (2003)

See also

*Akbar Ganji
*Saeed Hajjarian
*Human rights in Islamic Republic of Iran

References

External links

* [http://www.iran-amirentezam.com The official web site of Mr. Entezam]
* [http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,922076,00.html Time: Stalking the Conspirators] , Jul. 28, 1980