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Reuters
Veteran Iranian journalist arrested amid crackdown
Iran's Press
Court has jailed Masoud Behnoud, a veteran secular journalist, as
the campaign against the independent press moved beyond the mainstream
Islamic reform movement.
Friends and
associates say , who first rose to prominence as a pre-revolutionary
television reporter, was sent to Tehran's Evin prison late on Wednesday
after interrogation by the court.
The official
IRNA news agency confirmed the arrest on Thursday, saying a temporary
detention order had been issued against .
IRNA said the
prosecutor had filed 85 charges against the journalist, the latest
in a string of arrests and detention orders aimed at editors, journalists
and publishers. However, it gave no details of the accusations.
After a career
in television under the monarchy, Behnoud joined the influential
Azadegan in the run-up to the 1979 Islamic Revolution.
The newspaper
was later closed as the clerical authorities cemented their grip
on the new Islamic republic, but continued to publish magazines
and journals.
In the explosion
of independent media after the election in 1997 of moderate President
Mohammad Khatami, he contributed to a number of the reformist newspapers
backing the president. He was also an author and a regular commentator
on Iran for the BBC.
Journalists
and analysts say his arrest marks a new turn in the clerical establishment's
press crackdown, which saw the mass closure of pro-reform newspapers
in April.
Previous arrests
have largely focused on leading Islamic modernists among the Iranian
press corps, but they say the detention of Behnoud suggest that
circle is being expanded to include leftists, liberals and the so-called
religious nationalists.
The crackdown
was boosted on Sunday, when supreme clerical leader Ayatollah Ali
Khamenei ordered the pro-reform parliament to kill debate on a bill
to ease Iran's tough press laws.
Since then,
authorities have closed the last major reformist daily and ordered
the arrest of two prominent journalists, including Behnoud.
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