posted February 13, 2001 09:14               

February 12, 2001

Tehran, IRAN. Amir Abbas Fahr-Avar, a 25-year-old journalist with the newspaper "Mosharecat," which was banned last April, was arrested again on the evening of February 6 by agents from the Ministry of Information.

That ministry investigates matter of state security.

Fahr-Avar gained notoriety for his criticism of the Islamic regime and by investigating the deaths of about 120 Iranian public figures between 1995 and 1998.

On August 19 of last year, he was arrested and held in the political section of Evin Prison. He was freed in the third week of November, then re-arrested on December 31 after granting an interview to the U.S.-based Voice of Iran radio station.

In the interview, he described the conditions under which student leaders Ahmad Batebi and Akbar and Manouchehr Mohammadi are being held in Evin Prison.

Fahr-Avar was brutally beaten while in prison, which cause a worldwide outpouring of protest that led authorities to free him at the end of January 2001.