Iran

We appealed on behalf of Dr. Mohammad Hossien Rafiee, professor of chemistry at Tehran University, who had been arrested with other opposition members for expressing his political views, and urged that he and his colleagues be given a fair and open trial, hitherto denied them.

After three years in detention, Manuchehr Mohammadi, the Secretary General of the National Alliance of Iran's Students and Alumni was transferred from a relatively safe prison for political prisoners to a prison for dangerous criminals. Since it was Mr. Mohammadi's participation in pro-democracy demonstrations at Tehran University in July of 1999--clearly within the bounds of the internationally-recognized right to freedom of expression--that resulted in his imprisonment, we called upon the Iranian authorities to release him immediately. But since Mr. Mohammadi's current imprisonment in the city of Ghaemshahr's criminal prison put his life in imminent and grave peril, we requested that at the very least he be returned to his previous prison.

Israel

Two letters, one to Chairman Arafat and one to Prime Minister Sharon, called on each for an end to attacks on health professionals and, indeed, to attacks on unarmed civilians as well. The placement of weapons in Red Crescent ambulances and their use as firing platforms, as transport for gunmen, and as concealment for suicide/homicide bombers is in itself a gross violation of the principles of medical neutrality and has provided cause for Israeli attacks on such ambulances. The IDF obstruction of the delivery of medical supplies, detention of medical workers, and delaying of wounded individuals from reaching medical care, also disregards international standards. We called for an end to both. We also expressed our satisfaction at the exemplary behavior of many of the Israeli and Palestinian medical workers in their care for the wounded without regard for political divisions.

A call by European scholars to suspend European-Israeli academic and cultural ties prompted us to issue a statement decrying this reprehensible attempt to make scientific scholarship a pawn in a politically-motivated game. Not only did we send out a mass mailing of our statement but we also posted it on our Web site for public perusal. In addition, we signed on to a statement sent out by the International Council of Scientific Unions (ICSU) condemning the boycott.

The generally left-leaning Haifa University proposed subjecting one of its own post-Zionist faculty, Senior Lecturer Dr. Ilan Pappe, to a trial for libeling other professors, among other charges. It was thought that this trial was but a pretext to dismiss Dr. Pappe for having earlier supported his own graduate student whose M.A. thesis was judged in a court of law to have been an ideologically-driven fabrication based on inexcusably leading questions. We sent the dean of the university a letter of inquiry about the inherent possibility of an infringement of academic freedom. He replied in full that the charges were related to libel, not to questions of political freedom. He also indicated that some of the charges were indeed of a criminal nature and that therefore they would be referred to the police. A while later, we wrote again in search of further details of the developing case and were informed that matters were still under consideration.

An Israeli raid of the Jerusalem offices of the PLO representative Sari Nusseibeh, a well-known moderate Palestinian, drew us to address the Israeli government. We urged that inasmuch as Mr. Nusseibeh also acts as the president of Al-Quds University and the offices are those of the university as well, the functioning of the University itself not be in any way affected by the office closure.

Jonathan Ben-Artzi, a young physics and mathematics student at Hebrew University, having failed in his attempt to be designated a conscientious objector by the Commission dealing with such matters and having lost his appeal to the Supreme Court, served several 28-day prison sentences, and at the date of this writing, remains imprisoned. We protested this decision to the Minister of Defense and received the less-than-satisfactory response that as Mr. Ben-Artzi's request had been considered and denied, he was therefore obligated to enlist in the army and had been sentenced to prison for a disciplinary offence. In December, Mr. Ben-Artzi was sentenced to his sixth prison term, this time for 35 days, for his continuing refusal to obey the induction order.

Egypt

Early in the year we hailed the overturning of the conviction and release from prison of Dr. Saadeddin Ibrahim, who had been arrested on spurious charges in retaliation for his activities as founder of the Ibn Khaldun Center for Development Studies, which monitors human rights as well as the conduct of elections. His ill health, compounded by the series of strokes he suffered while in detention, made his release especially welcome. But since there were charges still pending, we voiced our hope that he be completely exonerated and that such charges against him be dropped.

However, Dr. Ibrahim's retrial, which began on April 27 was marred by the denial to his defense team of access to the Ibn Khaldun center, where important supporting evidence was expected to be found. We asked again that the charges against Dr. Ibrahim be dropped, as no evidence was presented of any misuse of funds--funds that had been provided by the European Union to produce a documentary film on Egyptian voting practices. However, Dr. Ibrahim was sentenced in July to seven years in prison for embezzlement, receiving foreign funds without authorization, and harming Egypt's reputation. Sentences of varying lesser lengths were also meted out to 27 of his colleagues at the Khaldun Center.

In what promises to be the final chapter of Dr. Ibrahim's two-and-a-half year ordeal, the Court of Cassation in early December annulled the seven-year sentence meted out twice by the Supreme State Security Court and declared that it itself would hear the case on January 7, 2003. Dr. Ibrahim, still in fragile health, was released from prison awaiting this hearing. This decision raises hopes that Professor Ibrahim and his colleagues will be cleared of all charges stemming from his research and outspoken criticism of government policies.

2002 Reports by Region

• Asia
• Europe
• Middle East/Africa
• Africa
• The Americas