Iran Feature: The Fear in the Corridors of Evin Prison (Theodoulou)

From grim experience, Maziar Bahari knows the fear that is probably gripping eight Iranian journalists who were arrested late last month and taken to Tehran's notorious Evin prison.

Mr Bahari was among the approximately 100 journalists detained in June 2009 during the tumult following president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's disputed re-election.

The latest crackdown on reporters affiliated with reformist news outlets appears to be aimed at muzzling dissenting or independent voices, and suggests that as Iran gears up for its next presidential election in June, the regime's fears of unrest are escalating.

"My guess is they're all in solitary confinement," said Mr Bahari, an Iranian-Canadian journalist and filmmaker who spent 118 days in Evin, all but 11 of them alone in a small cell.

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Iran Interview: UN's Special Rapporter on Human Rights to Tehran "Co-Operate With Me"

My work will continue. I will be able to produce a report, because many among the Iranian diaspora and the Iranian NGO network are actually very active in documenting issues and cases, and presenting the material that are addressed in the mandate with very sound evidence. So, I am not basing my work on hearsay, I am basing my work on first-hand testimonies, established evidence, and things that can be scientifically proven to be logical research on the subject.

What would be missing from my report would be my representation of the perspective from the Iranian government in its own words as to why things are the way they are. In the absence of this cooperation, the pressure on Iran will mount to respond to this, and it would perhaps become far more difficult to come back later and try to explain it. It is far easier and more productive for them to explain this as we go along, and to work with me to try and find the confidence that things in Iran will start to improve.

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