Ganji says remarks "distorted" -- agency
TEHRAN, Jan 26 (Reuters) - Iranian journalist Akbar Ganji, in prison
after being convicted on dissent charges, has said remarks he made to Reuters
and two Western newspapers were "distorted," his brother told
the official IRNA news agency on Friday.
IRNA quoted Asghar Ganji as saying his brother's prison interview, carried
out earlier this week in writing through an intermediary, was misrepresented.
"The things published quoting Akbar Ganji in a number of foreign
publications have been denied," IRNA said.
"Asghar Ganji has said the material published by the Guardian,
the International
Herald Tribune and Reuters
quoting his brother Akbar Ganji, the imprisoned journalist, have been distorted."
IRNA did not cite specific parts of the interview, in which Ganji warned
of political turmoil if conservatives did not relax their pressure.
Reuters and the two newspapers, which submitted the questions in writing,
checked the full translation with the intermediary prior to publication.
He replied by approving the translation.
The intermediary, a family member of one of Ganji's cellmates, said
on Friday that Ganji was under mounting pressure from hardliners after
granting the interview and wanted to renounce it in time for Saturday's
Iranian newspapers.
The conservative press attacked the interview, Ganji's first since his
conviction on charges stemming from his part in an international conference
in Berlin, setting off panic among Ganji's friends and family.
"The Ganji family is afraid of what the newspapers are going to
say on Saturday," said the intermediary, who asked not to be identified.
Ganji, a veteran revolutionary, first angered the establishment with
revelations in the press of what he claimed was high-level complicity in
the murders of secular dissidents. The charges have been strenuously denied.
His reports won him a wide following and produced best- selling compilations,
but his fame could not protect him from legal action by the conservative-led
judiciary.
Earlier this month he was sentenced to 10 years in prison, with five
more in exile, for undermining national security and related crimes. Other
charges are still pending.
Links
