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Iranian officials have barred Iranian journalist and human rights activist Emadeddin Baghi from traveling to the United States for an awards ceremony in New York. Baghi was scheduled to receive the Civil Courage Prize from the Northcote Parkinson Fund, which honors "steadfast resistance to evil at great personal risk." Officials confiscated Baghi's passport and prevented him from boarding a flight out of Tehran on October 4. The Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) reported that a state security agent informed Baghi that a court order prohibited him from leaving the country. In addition to attending the ceremony in New York, Baghi was planning to meet with human rights experts in the Netherlands and Canada. In 2000, the Iranian government jailed Baghi for publishing articles about the role of the country's intelligence ministry in the 1998 murders of several Iranian intellectuals and dissidents. After his release in February 2003, CPJ says that Baghi has been subjected to ongoing surveillance and court summonses. Baghi, who has authored 20 books, now heads the Committee for Defense of Prisoners Rights. |