Rouhani Defends Rights of Academics in Iran After Prison Death

(Bloomberg) -- Iran’s President Hassan Rouhani defended the need for greater freedoms for academics and university researchers in the Islamic Republic following the controversial death of a environmentalist in a Tehran prison.

“It’s not right that we should be suspicious of our academics and professors -- undue harshness must be stopped,” Rouhani was cited as saying in speech in Tehran on Saturday by the state-run Islamic Republic New Agency. He said academics must interact with foreign counterparts and the outside world without being questioned for it by authorities.

Rouhani comments come after it emerged on Feb. 11 that a prominent Iranian-Canadian environmentalist and professor at Iran’s Imam Sadegh University, Kavous Seyed Emami, died while being held at a prison in Tehran. Judicial authorities claim that Emami killed himself, but their account has been rejected by his family who say they were denied an independent autopsy.

Rouhani’s senior legal adviser, Shahindokht Molaverdi, said a special committee was in the process of investigating Emami’s death and the detention of several other environmentalists who were arrested with him in late January and remain in prison, according to the semi-official Iranian Labour News Agency.

She said a short film broadcast by the state-run Islamic Republic of Iran Broadcasting, which has a monopoly over terrestrial broadcasting in Iran, accusing Emami of being a spy for the United States and Israel, was "unfortunate" and "conflicted with the country’s privacy and civil rights laws," the Iranian Labour News Agency reported.

To contact the reporter on this story: Golnar Motevalli in Tehran at gmotevalli@bloomberg.net.

To contact the editors responsible for this story: Shaji Mathew at shajimathew@bloomberg.net, Christopher Elser

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