For her and her loved ones, the ordeal continues. French-Iranian researcher Fariba Adelkhah, detained since 2019 in Iran, has been reincarcerated in Tehran for violating the rules of her house arrest, Iranian justice announced on Sunday.
“Unfortunately, Mrs. Adelkhah deliberately violated the limits set on her house arrest dozens of times and as a result, she was sent back to prison,” deputy head of the judiciary, Kazem Gharibabadi, was quoted by Mizan as saying. Iranian Justice News Agency.
62-year-old Fariba Adelkhah had been under house arrest since October 2020 in Tehran and had to wear an electronic bracelet, with limited movement within a radius of 300 m. A specialist in Shiism and post-revolutionary Iran at the Paris Institute of Political Studies (Sciences-po), she was arrested in June 2019 and then sentenced in May 2020 to five years in prison for undermining national security. , which his relatives have always fiercely disputed.
Kazem Gharibabadi regretted that the researcher ignored “repeated warnings from the judicial authorities”. The Fariba Adelkhah support committee rejected the accusations in a press release on Sunday: “She fundamentally respected the limitations placed on her freedom of movement,” said Béatrice Hibou, CNRS research director.
“The issue is not whether Fariba Adelkhah has, or has not, complied with the terms of her house arrest. The reality is that this house arrest, the five-year prison sentence and the very arrest of Fariba Adelkhah, on June 5, 2019, never had the slightest basis and were all iniquitous and illegitimate acts”, added Bétarice Hibou.
France denounces an “arbitrary decision”
According to her, “Fariba Adelkhah is innocent (…). assertions of power judicial Iranian are therefore null and void and will not silence the indignation that rose around the world at the announcement of his reincarceration on Wednesday,” she added.
Emmanuel Macron had described Thursday the decision of the Iranian authorities as “totally arbitrary”, affirming that “France as a whole” was “mobilized for [la] liberation” of the researcher. The day before, the French Ministry of Foreign Affairs had warned that his reincarceration “could only have negative consequences” on bilateral relations and “reduce confidence” between the two countries.
The deputy head of the judiciary said on Sunday that these statements were “unfounded” and denounced the interference of foreign countries in the Iranian judicial system. Iran does not recognize dual nationality and treats those arrested as Iranian citizens.
Several dual nationals and another French citizen, Benjamin Brière, are detained in Iran. In recent years, the Islamic Republic has carried out several exchanges of detainees with foreign countries. Fariba Adelkhah and her companion, the Africanist Roland Marchal, who came to join her for a private visit, were arrested on June 5, 2019 at Tehran airport by the Revolutionary Guards, the ideological army of the Islamic Republic.
Concerns for his physical health
He was released on March 20, 2020 as part of an exchange of detainees between Tehran and Paris. Relatives of the researcher also expressed concern about the physical health of the researcher. François Pacquemant, in charge of History and Strategic Thinking at the French Development Agency (AFD) and member of the Fariba support committee, was particularly concerned about her health “weakened by the hunger strike she went on in December 2019” and “uncertainties caused by the health situation”.
His reincarceration comes a few days after the death of Iranian poet and dissident Baktash Abtin, who died in prison after contracting Covid-19 there, according to revelations from several human rights organizations. They accuse Tehran of being responsible for this death.
This reversal comes as Iran and several countries (France, United Kingdom, Germany, Russia, China, plus the United States indirectly) relaunched talks at the end of November to save the 2015 Iranian nuclear agreement. , supposed to prevent Tehran from acquiring atomic weapons, which Tehran denies.