Roxana Saberi Update: Positive Signs Despite a Hopeless TV Interview

ABC Television Good Morning America's summary of an interview with President Ahmadinejad

In general, there has been little news from Iran on the status of Roxana Saberi, the Iranian-American journalist sentenced last week to 8 years in prison on espionage charges. Amidst the lull in developments, some Western media are highlighting the plea by Saberi's fiancé, Iranian filmmaker Bahman Ghobadi, for her release.

The relative silence may not be bad, given signs of behind-the-scenes manoeuvres for a reduction in Saberi's sentence and possibly her release from prison. On Tuesday, Iranian spokesman Ali Reza Jamshidi reinforced weekend signals from President Ahmadinejad's office that leniency would be welcomed, "We can't influence the judge's verdict (but hope) the verdict will be reconsidered at the appeals court."

There is room for manoeuvre. Under Iran's Islamic Criminal Code, the judge has the discretion to suspend all or part of the sentence or convert it to a fine. Sentences in cases which go to appeal in Iran are almost always reduced, and other factors in favour of a reduction include Saberi's lack of a previous criminal record and the significant fact that she has not appeared on television to "confess" her crimes.

There may even be a discreet intervention by the Supreme Leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei. It was his confidante, Ayatollah Mahmoud Hashemi Shahroudi, who decreed as head of the Iranian judiciary, "the necessity of access to fair consideration of Roxana Saberi's case, especially at the appeals stage, which is the certain right of the accused".

Hopefully, these positive signals will not be undermined by this morning's showboating idiocy by the American ABC Television. Their morning programme, "Good Morning America", turned a 30-minute interview with President Ahmadinejad into a self-promoting rescue of Saberi. After asking superficial questions about the US-Iranian, and more specifically the Ahmadinejad-Obama relationship (so superficial that Ahmadinejad's reply isn't shown but summarised), reporter George Stephanopoulos turned to Saberi's case.

However, instead of engaging Ahmadinejad's diversionary response, "I do not judge in judicial cases," which turned into a challenge to US concern, "to encourage friendship, [President Obama] should allow our laws to be processed fairly" --- you know, by asking why Saberi did not have a public trial and why there still has been no disclosure of evidence against her --- Stephanopoulos struck a white-knight pose, "May I go see her for myself to assure that she is safe?"

The ABC report ends with Stephanopoulos telling the studio, "We're going over to [the Judiciary Department] right now," to get permission to enter Evin prison. Let's hope that others, less publicly and much more relevantly, are moving towards a real resolution.