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Please support Saeed - Web Dev facing death sentence in Iran

158 points by xer0x ↗ HN
My friend Saeed disappeared 2 years ago while he visited Iran. He is now facing false charges with deadly consequences. The court and government responsible for making this decision are actively hostile towards the internet. I know our HN community values freedom and technology, and if you can share the links below with your friends, or do anything to support Saeed.

"While working as developer in Canada, Saeed designed a program that would allow his clients to upload pictures, and as is a common courtesy in programming, included his name and info in the file. This program, Saeed’s wife – Dr. Fatimeh Eftekhari – explains, was used in an adult content website WITHOUT Saeed’s knowledge or approval. “The only recognizable name in the program was Saeed’s,” she continued, “which led to his arrest” and to the accusations claiming that Saeed was responsible for the development and administration of the website." from http://united4iran.org/2010/10/the-case-of-saeed-malekpour-web-developer-jailed-since-2008/

Please send letters of support for Saeed: http://org2.democracyinaction.org/o/6160/p/dia/action/public/?action_KEY=4449

Thank-you

55 comments

[ 3.4 ms ] story [ 128 ms ] thread
bobds
This is the first I hear about this story, words escape me really. I can't imagine where Saeed finds the strength to keep going after two years of torture.

Can we do something more meaningful/effective than sending e-letters?

jrockway
Can we do something more meaningful/effective than sending e-letters?

Overthrow the government?

points
I'm not sure that has worked out so well in the past. Invading places to bring them a particular definition of freedom is a bad idea.

Definitely if the citizens themselves want to take action, then it's up to them to do so.

When you live somewhere, you play by the rules of that country... and if it's a country that doesn't have good rules, you can emigrate.

davepage
To where? If you think the crappy states lets anyone in, do some research.
points
Well he was already in Canada... He was arrested while "visiting Iran".
tomjen3
>When you live somewhere, you play by the rules of that country

>We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.

Notice that it doesn't say all Americans are created equal or free, but all people. Iran has no right to trample on inalienable rights.

points
Did you just try to assert that the United States Declaration of independence should apply to all of humanity?

Mind. Blown.

tomjen3
Yes, or at least the principles on which it was based.

And I am not an America, so this is not a nationalism issue.

points
"Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness." is such a wooly useless statement though.

You could argue that based on the above, the US shouldn't have a minimum age limit for alcohol since it clearly infringes on teenagers (heck even college kids) pursuit of happiness.

I'm not arguing that it's correct that they have strict laws about pornography, nor would I argue that it's incorrect that the US has strict laws on alcohol. It's up to each country where to set its own laws.

xenophanes
The US shouldn't have a minimum age limit on alcohol. It's a victimless crime law. Ugh.
points
I can't quite tell if you're being sarcastic or not.
xenophanes
I'm not being sarcastic. I'm a libertarian (i.e. classical liberal). I think people should have freedom to do things that don't hurt others.

It's only legitimate to stop people drinking when there's some danger involved, e.g. drinking with driving. One can argue for other cases like drinking heavily with a "mean drunk" personality type, or drinking heavily without the experience/knowledge to be safe in that situation. Drinking with being aged 20 isn't inherently dangerous. And it's a bad (both inaccurate and ageist) proxy for the other things that actually matter.

jawee
The ideas which inspired the Declaration of Independence were thought to apply to all people. It goes back to the ideas of the social contract and the purpose of the government. That's why the Americans felt justified in breaking from Britain in what some consider the first revolution of their kind in history... men such as Jefferson really believed that the government was not protecting the rights they believed all men had. Maybe they were justified or maybe they weren't, but this was the justification they used to break from Britain. Others have used these same ideas to break away from tyrannical rule far worse or overthrow previous governments.
united4iran
Well Iran is signatory to these principals in the form of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and the Int'l Covenant on Civil Rights.
stcredzero
Notice that it doesn't say all Americans are created equal or free, but all people. Iran has no right to trample on inalienable rights.

Granted, but it doesn't necessarily follow that we have the right to trample on Iran to protect such rights. In fact, that reasoning would seem a bit contradictory.

rbanffy
> and if it's a country that doesn't have good rules, you can emigrate.

Sadly, most of the time, they can't. Many times it's not even no other country would take them in, but their own country won't let them out.

tomjen3
Short of overthrowing the government, you could try to get Amnesty to add him to their letter writing campaign, they have a pretty decent track record of saving people and they already have more people writing letters now than you could ever get on HN.
bobds
That's not a bad idea.

I was hoping that xer0x, being a friend of Saeed, could point us in the right direction. Perhaps his family could use some donations to hire lawyers, experts or whatever else is needed.

united4iran
Unfortunately, they aren't allowing him access to independent legal representation. What Saeed needs right now, big time, is access to the technology that will allow him to prove his case and disprove the IRI's baseless charges.
jrockway
I don't think there's much that letter writing is going to solve. It seems he's an Iranian citizen from Iran that is subject to Iran's criminal justice system. Yeah, Iran has a poor human rights record, but writing an email is not going to fix that problem.
pyre
I could be mistaking the tone of your post, but it seems rather defeatist. Sure email, might not do a lot, but acceptance of the situation usually doesn't engender the fast-track to change.
michael_dorfman
On the other hand, taking an easy but useless action doesn't engender the fast-track to change, either-- it only gives a sense of complacency and self-satisfaction.
lukevdp
Stories like this blow my mind and make me very thankful to live in a free country.

I don't care what anybody says about being ethnocentric and relativistic morals and "it's their country, their rules". This country has absurd rules and it's just wrong.

Letters aren't going to do anything, in countries like Iran they arrest their own citizens for speaking out, I can't see non citizens having any effect at all.

united4iran
I am so impressed by how far this story has traveled in such a short amount of time. I'm part of the org that worked with Saeed's wife to initiate this campaign. She is a brilliant woman. I wanted to quickly address letters. They DO work. We have, in the last few months, received emails from foreign ministers and their representatives promising that they will address it with Iran's officials as they visit the countries, that they will continue to pass ont he information, and even releasing statements of condemnation. With Iran, it will ALWAYS remain a PR game, and the end goal is to 1) highlight the cases and 2) get the world community to decry them. Name and shame, assign blame, embarrass Iran. That is their biggest fear, truly.

Thanks to all! Mana United4Iran.org

AlexMuir
Here's something we actually could do (not that any of us will do it. Beyond upvoting and a bit of commenting on freedom/politics, no one is going to lift a finger, me included). Find the name of someone who holds power on this decision (we'd need somebody to help us with this). Then Google bomb their name (in English/Arabic/Farsi) to the top of Google with a site about the case and leave an open end for them to decide - did they condemn a man to death, or show clemency and release him?
techiferous
You're assuming that said person frequents the Internet.
AlexMuir
Or that members of his (no doubt large, and Western educated) family do. Or that the media cover it. But it's academic because I'm not doing it, and nor are you.
adrianwaj
Someone build a site about how great is Sharia, Iran and its Ayotollah. Then use the photo script that he wrote, and make it clear how his script was used. Then tweet it to @ahmadinejad and we'll all retweet it.

edit: can turn it into an http://act.ly/ petition too, the site could just be image uploads of Acqua Dinner jackets

lukevdp
Great idea in theory... Until you have to actually say how Sharia law is great, then you've got nothing to say
InclinedPlane
That's the ticket, kowtow to brutal dictatorships to win their favor. That always works.
adrianwaj
Hacking the dictatorship, buddy.
Deestan
Have you tried contacting Amnesty International? This case sounds right up their alley, so they should at least be able to give helpful advice.
united4iran
Yes - we in fact work with Amnesty to do most of this. They don't do as much online advocacy as much as encouraging people to write actual letters -- bc of the short amount of time left before Saeed's trial, we decided to go the route of e-letters. Amnesty has an AMAZING track record though, recently spoke with one of their Iran team and she noted that since AI's advent, using these types of campaigns have seen 44,000 prisoners released.
semuelf
Can we nominate him to Darwin award?
araneae
For visiting his dying father in Iran? For putting his name in the comments of a script he wrote?
[dead] semuelf
For entering Iran. Stay where human rights have meaning, and if you don't, don't complain if you get the wrong side of the stick.
rythie
> Trial scheduled for October 26, 2010
ajx
welcome to iran
sharpn
Sorry to hear that. I've contacted Amnesty's International Secretariat to see if they can help.
[deleted]
(comment deleted)
united4iran
I noted this below as a comment, but really wanted all to see it in case it gets skipped o'er. Do letters work? Yes.

U4I has, in the last few months, received emails from foreign ministers and their representatives promising that they will address it with Iran's officials as they visit the countries, that they will continue to pass on the information, and even releasing statements of condemnation.

With Iran, it will ALWAYS remain a PR game, and the end goal is to 1) highlight the cases and 2) get the world community to decry them. Name and shame, assign blame, embarrass Iran. That is their biggest fear, truly.

An example is below of how effective letter writing CAN be.

--

"The Dutch minister of Foreign Affairs Verhagen has received a number of emails highlighting the case of the 7 Baha'i Leaders, generated through your website. I would like to inform you minister Verhagen has publicly expressed his concern about their fate: http://www.minbuza.nl/en/News/Newsflashes/2010/08/Netherland... _about_fate_of_Iranian_Baha%E2%80%99i_leaders

Best regards, Bart Rijs Spokersperson minister of Foreign Affairs The Hague The Netherlands

---

So does it work? Yes. Slowly sometimes, but yes. Knowing you're being watched DOES indeed change your behavior. Just ask Roxana Saberi :) Thanks to all, this is quite the community!

gdee
Anybody from Spain knows of a better address to send letters to the new Spanish "Minister of External Affairs and Cooperation", Trinidad Jiménez, than informae@mae.es (which itself is rather well hidden on the ministry's website) ?
united4iran
Try Beatriz Lorenzo, she's an official at Spain's Human Rights office: beatriz.lorenzo@maec.es
freesaeednow
"Free Saeed" plastered all over Canadian government websites might get their attention, especially if followed by mailbombs.