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y ou have been speaking to a variety of audiences interna-tionally. What motivates your visits? What do you want to achieve at this moment in time? A few things. I hope to increase awareness of human rights violations in Iran, which I experienced during my imprisonment. I also met other women

who were experiencing injustices and I realised how important it is for people out-side prison to speak out for those who are struggling to make their own voices heard. Not just for political prisoners or prisoners of conscience who are being punished for peacefully standing up for basic rights, but also others who are facing injustices, it empower them when they know that they are not alone. I also try to tell the story of my own personal journey when I was imprisoned. I fell to one of my lowest points,

“speAking Out fOR tHOse WHO CAnnOt Be HeARd”Iranian-American journalist Roxana Saberi visits her alma mater’s campus in Qatar to speak about her book, Between Two Worlds: My Lifeand Captivity in Iran.Qatar Today caught up with her...

Roxana Saberi,Iranian-American journalist

by Myriam Chandana

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and then I tried to pull myself up again through a renewed sense of faith; And also the inspiration that I got from many of my fellow prisoners who were stand-ing up for their principles, no matter what the cost.

How has this ordeal changed you as a person?In one way, it has made me reflect a lot more on human rights. Earlier, I some-times reported on issues of human rights or wrote about them, but never really thought about it, until I was deprived off my own rights. And then, I realised how valuable universal human rights like freedom of speech through expression, the right to be presumed innocent until proven guilty in a fair and public trial are. I wasn’t allowed to have an attorney for several weeks. I wasn’t allowed to tell my family where I was. And I was threatened with many years in prison and even the death penalty. I realised that these are rights that people would want, no matter where they were in the world, regardless of what their background, nationality, re-ligion, political affiliation, or ideology. When I was freed, I appreciated my free-dom more than before and felt a respon-sibility to join others in speaking out for those who cannot make their own voices heard.

What kind of actions are you currently taking to support human rights organisations or other people like you who are fighting against human rights violations in Iran?Wherever human rights violations take place, they should be addressed – wheth-er that’s in the West or the East. And I am just one of the many who are doing this. In my talks, I address these issues and bring attention to violations in Iran. I try to speak about it as much as I can in the media, by doing interviews and writ-ing op-eds. In my book, I tell the story of student activists, followers of a civil dis-obedience movement, and two of my cell-mates who were two of the seven detained leaders of Iran’s minority Baha’i faith, who were sentenced to 20 years in prison last month. They are being persecuted for

their religious beliefs, in my opinion. The sentence was reduced to 10 years, but 10 years is still a long time! I ask people I speak to do their part by signing petitions or writing letters to Iranian officials at the United Nations or to their own lawmak-ers, because a mass effort over a period of time will be very effective.

What do you believe resulted in your release? The international attention in my case played a huge role in pressuring the Ira-nian authorities to release me when they did. Social media played a huge role – the news of my capture, and then my subse-quent hunger strike went viral through a lot of online support groups.

You have upheld throughout your book that the truth is im-portant to you. But you were initially sentenced to eight years in prison for telling the

truth. What is your message to wrongly accused human rights activists, journalists and cre-ative artists who do not have the kind of backing you did? Not just in Iran but in other countries? I am very fortunate that I had internation-al attention on my case and a large part of it because I was American, my mother is Japanese, and I worked for international news organisations like Fox News and BBC. That is why when I was freed I felt very glad for my freedom, but I felt a lot of sorrow for those prisoners I was leav-ing behind who did not have the kind of international attention but deserved free-dom all the same. It is always a personal decision; at what price are you willing to stand up for these. I don’t look down on those who make false confessions under pressure. Some people are actually physi-cally tortured. I was not so it is hard to compare. Some are not able to leave the country after they are free, so if they re-cant their false confessions there can be serious repercussions for them and their entire families. So, it is really a personal decision. Incidentally, a lot of the women I met, were more willing to stay in prison than live on telling lies.

A prevalent theme throughout your book was conspiracy the-ories, the Iranian Intelligence’s belief that the US is fabricat-ing schemes, sending highly qualified intellectuals to work in Iran to spy on the regime, as in your case. Do you think the leadership in Iran truly be-lieves this? Is there any proof to justify this belief?Every state in the world faces national security threats. But I think hardliners in Iran often knowingly target innocent peo-ple because they want to intimidate cer-tain groups in society and believe these people represent those groups. By doing this, they can scare other likeminded peo-ple like journalists, bloggers, opposition figures, or even scholars. It is possible that with the spread of ideas about democracy and human rights, that these hardliners who do not want democratic rights will

Born in Belleville, New Jersey, and raised in Fargo, North Da-kota, Saberi holds bachelorÕ s de-grees in communications and French from Concordia College in Minnesota, as well as masterÕ s degrees in broadcast journalism from Northwestern University and in international relations from the University of Cambridge. She has reported for ABC Radio, the BBC, Feature Story News, Fox News, NPR, and PRI. Saberi moved to Iran in 2003, and currently lives in North Dakota.

Saberi was arrested in Janu-ary 2009 while working on a book about the people and issues in Iran. She was convicted in a half-hour trial, which resulted in an 8-year prison sentence. Before be-ing freed on appeal, Saberi was held in solitary confinement for five months, during which time her ordeal attracted internation-al attention, including a protest from the Doha Centre for Media Freedom.

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be threatened. But the methods that they are using, by locking people up and using force and brutality, they are creating re-sentment in society which itself is a threat to them in the long run. They also like to make examples of people just to justify their argument that Iran is under threat by foreign powers and people outside the country who are conspiring with foreign powers to spy or overthrow the govern-ment. In the name of national security, maintain a tight grip on society.

In a documentary on Iran, Christiane Amanpour said that Iran currently is a “schizophrenic society.” Do you agree?

There are a lot of conflicts in society, and I think Iran is caught between modernity and tradition, and the East and West, and nationalism and internationalism. On an individual level, a lot of people have dual or multiple identities because

of these clashes between conservative and liberal, but also because they often act differently in public than they do in private. Often times, what they do in pri-

vate might be considered illegal in public.For example watching satellite television or dancing in a between men and women in a mixed gender private party. A lot of people learn to lie in public. Par-ents tell their children if someone comes

to your door and asks if you have satel-lite television, you say no, even if you do. And people eventually develop multiple identities n

Ò When a bird realises that it is other than the cage, it is already free.Ó With these liberating words of 17 century Persian poet Saeb Tabrizi Ð Roxana Saberi begins her memoir, Between Two Worlds: My Life and Captivity in Iran.

Followed by a brief note on the con-

tent of her book and her style of writing, Saberi, an Iranian-American journalist who was imprisoned in Iran last year on charges of espionage, delves into a distressing ac-count of her time in TehranÕ s notorious Evin Prison.

Before reading Between Two Worlds: My Life and Cap-tivity in Iran, few would have received an insight into what happens within the walls of a looming edifice located right at the foot of the sce-nic Alborz Mountains. In her book, Saberi chronicles the 100 days she spent in Section 209 of Evin – a wing known for housing political prisoners since the 1979 Islamic Revo-lution Ð punctuating it with

Iranian political history and culture, current events, and personal stories from the six years she spent in the country.

As she narrates her own ordeal, Saberi raises key issues which have placed Iran in the international spot-light in the recent past. Mainly, she

points out the importance of what she believes are universal human rights and tenets of media freedom. She also makes an effort to relate the agendas of Iranian Ò hardlinersÓ and their im-pacts on lives of journalists, lawyers, and human rights activists in Iran, who eventually end up becoming po-litical prisoners.

The main aspect working in favour of SaberiÕ s account is her journalistic tone and objective reporting of facts. Several paragraphs throughout her book, especially those describing common perceptions, echo the pitch of a news report on US-Iran relations.

Through vivid characters like Javan Ð the interrogator and Haj Khanom Ð one of the prison wardens, and strong dialogue construction, Saberi conveys her interaction with her captors.

Concise and unexaggerated, Be-tween Two Worlds: My Life and Cap-tivity in Iran, is SaberiÕ s informative account of controversial issues sur-rounding the Iranian intelligence, gov-ernment, and judicial system, coupled with a gripping narration of her own position amidst the three entities. Without doubt, a captivating read.

book reVieW: BeTween Two worlds: My life and CapTiviTy in iran

Ò When I was freed, I appreciated my freedom more than before and felt a responsibility to join others in speaking out for those who cannot make their own voices heard.Ó

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