Statement of the Association of Iranian Journalists on the Suspension of Shahrvand Emrooz Journal and Cancellation of the License of Arjang Weekly

   The ninth article of the Constitution expresses that: In the Islamic Republic of Iran, the freedom, independence, unity, and territorial integrity of the country are inseparable from one another, and their preservation is the duty of the government and all individual citizens. No individual, group, or authority, has the right to infringe in the slightest way upon the political, cultural, economic, and military independence or the territorial integrity of Iran under the pretext of exercising freedom. Similarly, no authority has the right to abrogate legitimate freedoms, not even by enacting laws and regulations for that purpose, under the pretext of preserving the independence and territorial integrity of the country.

 Unfortunately despite these express statements, we often witness measures taken by some establishments, which are themselves supposed to be preserving the Constitution, its execution and defending the rights and citizen freedoms in particular for press and journalists. Their measures cannot be called anything but violating law and lack of adherence to legitimate freedom and citizen rights. Continuous suspension and license cancellation of the press have been among the measures and approaches taken in recent years.

 We postpone evaluation of the performance of the Press Supervisory Board in the ninth government  and since it has been dominated by a particular thought and political trend to a later time, but as we have mentioned in other cases, the approach of this Board toward the press is based on a pessimistic and restrictive viewpoint; and therefore suspension and cancellation of license of journals by this Board has turned into an ordinary event, and as a whole, the professional independence and job security of journalists have been endangered and journalists do not really know what they should do so that they would not be worried about the future of their career and their costs of living.
Are the members of the Press Supervisory Board uninformed about the attempts and troubles which are to be made in order that a journal finds its readers and journalists can run their families through producing news, reports, thoughts and information giving to society, while they are fulfilling their social duties and responsibilities? What would be the benefits of continuation of such trend for people and the political system?

 The interesting point is that all these restrictive measures against press and journalists are justified by the articles of Press law. This is while the same Law stresses that if Press Supervisory Board bans a journal, it should send the records to court for investigation within a week. This is the legal requirement which has never been observed by the said Board and what has been put into practice is the continuous suspension of journals and journalists’ losing jobs and apparently this Board is never accountable to these incidents and the incurred losses.

 The Association of Iranian Journalists has always invited the establishments which are related to press affairs and their authorities to observe the law and respect the legitimate freedom and citizen rights, in particular press freedom and information giving process. This is the only demand it has made but unfortunately in a tiring way and by continuous resorting to some legal articles, the freedom of press, professional independence and job security of journalists have been attacked and almost no space is left for free and independent journalistic activities. The Association of Iranian Journalists beilives that continuation of this trend is not in favour of the country, nation and the sovereignty since depriving the press of their supervisory power will lead to increase of corruption and dictatorship. Thus, we consider suspension of Shahrvand Emrooz and cancellation of the license of Arjang as illegal & incorrect and we ask the Press Supervisory Board to reconsider its decisions and adopt a more optimistic and freedom-seeking approach toward press.