Results 1 to 8 of 8
  1. #1
    Thailand Expat Saint Willy's Avatar
    Join Date
    Aug 2019
    Last Online
    30-04-2022 @ 02:44 AM
    Posts
    11,204

    Calls to free academic Kylie Moore-Gilbert from Iran’s Qarchak Prison

    Academic Kylie Moore-Gilbert boarded a flight to Iran in August 2018 to attend a conference and conduct a few research interviews.
    Three weeks later she was stopped from flying back to Melbourne by Iran’s Revolutionary Guard after one of the people she interviewed reported her as suspicious.
    Since then she’s been secretly tried and convicted of espionage and is facing a 10-year prison sentence in Iranian prisons.

    Kylie Moore-Gilbert was meant to fly home to Melbourne, instead she was sent to jail. Picture: Australian Department for Foreign Affairs and TradeSource:AAP

    It’s been more than 700 days since she was arrested and the British-Australian dual national’s friends and colleagues are tired of waiting for the “quiet diplomacy” of the Australian government to secure her release.
    Letters smuggled out of Tehran’s notorious Evin Prison earlier this year “sent a really clear message that Kylie felt she was abandoned and she wanted more to be done for her,” Deakin University research fellow Dara Conduit told news.com.au.
    “She felt she’d been abandoned or forgotten, which she certainly hasn’t been, not by her colleagues and friends,” Dr Conduit said.
    She and other academics started talking about ways to keep Kylie’s imprisonment on the agenda earlier this year.
    They’ve now begun a campaign hoping to speed up Kylie’s release.


    “We hope that we can make a difference and we hope this will help to expedite Kylie’s return,” Dr Conduit said.
    “She will come home, there’s no doubt about it, but we hope she can come home sooner … When she comes home she can see how hard we fought for her. It’s something we’ve thought about every day since she was imprisoned.”
    Dr Conduit told news.com.au Kylie was merely an “innocent pawn”.
    “This is a dispute between Iran and Australia. Kylie just happened to be in the wrong place at the wrong time and Iran took her hostage as a useful tool to get Australia to do what it wanted.”

    Kylie Moore-Gilbert denied being a spy and refused to become one. Picture: University of Melbourne.Source:Supplied


    The aforementioned leaked letters also contained a definitive rejection of her charge as well as a refusal to work with Iranian authorities.
    “Please accept this letter as an official and definitive rejection of your offer to me to work with the intelligence branch of the Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps,” she wrote in letters to authorities seen by the Guardian.
    “I am not a spy. I have never been a spy and I have no interest to work for a spying organisation in any country,” she said.
    The Australian government has been pursuing a strategy of “quiet diplomacy” to secure her release.
    “But in late July Kylie was transferred to Qarchak Prison, seemingly without the government’s awareness,” Dr Conduit said.
    “This is a prison that’s known as one of the worst prisons in the world for women, and despite Australia having a really good bilateral relationship with Iran since 1968 – and we’ve been pursuing this quiet, respectful diplomacy since she was arrested – all of that hasn’t bought Australia so much as a courtesy call that Kylie’s situation had changed, so for us that was a rally call.”
    RELATED: Cops’ embarrassing ‘error’ after protest

    Iran’s Qarchak prison, where Kylie Moore-Gilbert was recently moved.Source:Supplied

    “The news that Dr Moore-Gilbert has been moved from Evin to Qarchak Prison is worrying and deeply distressing to her family, friends and her university colleagues,” Melbourne University vice-chancellor Duncan Maskell said in a statement last month, adding that the Government is doing all in its power.
    Dr Conduit said the current approach is not working, and while she believes the case will eventually be quietly solved behind closed doors, she said: “Whatever is being done is wholly insufficient and so far has led to no meaningful improvement in Kylie’s condition. In fact right now she’s being treated worse than any foreign national imprisoned in Iran.”
    Australia’s ambassador to Iran, Lyndall Sachs, visited Qarchak earlier this month and reported Kylie was “well and has access to food, medical facilities and books” according to a statement from the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade.

    https://www.news.com.au/technology/o...ac7ddaae02258f
    Warning: Be cautious if you are a fragile pink

  2. #2
    Thailand Expat David48atTD's Avatar
    Join Date
    Jan 2016
    Last Online
    @
    Location
    Palace Far from Worries
    Posts
    14,393
    Kylie Moore-Gilbert has been released in exchange for three Iranian men — who are they?

    -12923106-16x9-xlarge-jpg

    To secure her freedom, the academic was reportedly released in exchange for three Iranians held abroad.
    Here's what we know about them so far.


    The identities of the three prisoners have not been officially revealed, but several media outlets reported they are Saeid Moradi, Mohammad Khazaei and Masoud Sedaghat Zadeh.

    The prisoners have been held in Thailand on charges of having planned to assassinate Israeli officials in Bangkok in 2012.


    -12922782-3x2-xlarge-jpg
    Saeid Moradi (centre-left) and Mohammad Khazei (centre-right), pictured in 2013 at a Bangkok court.(AFP: Pornchai Kittiwongsakul)

    Their cover was blown after a botched explosion in their rented house, which resulted both of Mr Moradi's legs being blown off.

    Life sentence for Iranian wheelchair bound Bangkok bomber


    Here
    Someone is sitting in the shade today because someone planted a tree a long time ago ...


  3. #3
    Thailand Expat harrybarracuda's Avatar
    Join Date
    Sep 2009
    Last Online
    @
    Posts
    96,555
    Thailand confirms return of Iranians held over 2012 bomb plot

    Thailand confirms return of Iranians held over 2012 bomb plot

  4. #4
    Thailand Expat armstrong's Avatar
    Join Date
    Oct 2011
    Last Online
    @
    Posts
    6,882
    Was that the bomb on soi pridi?

  5. #5
    Thailand Expat
    BoganInParasite's Avatar
    Join Date
    Mar 2018
    Last Online
    30-07-2023 @ 02:51 PM
    Location
    Northern Thailand
    Posts
    2,074
    One of the funniest things I ever read was in regards to these guys and their house blowing up. Details are hazy but I seem to recall the guy who lost his legs was to a grenade that bounced back from a taxi that wouldn't stop for him/them. The comment that amused me was something like...."Well if we all started throwing grenades as Bangkok taxis that won't stop for us the place will start to look like Beirut in the seventies."

  6. #6
    Thailand Expat Saint Willy's Avatar
    Join Date
    Aug 2019
    Last Online
    30-04-2022 @ 02:44 AM
    Posts
    11,204

    Kylie Moore-Gilbert: Academic thanks supporters after Iran 'nightmare'

    A British-Australian academic freed from an Iran jail last week has thanked friends and supporters for helping her to endure the "unrelenting nightmare".


    In her first statement since arriving back in Australia, Kylie Moore-Gilbert said she had "no words to express the depth of my gratitude".


    Dr Moore-Gilbert was arrested in Iran in September 2018 and had been serving a 10-year sentence on spying charges.


    She was released in a prisoner swap for three Iranians, Tehran said.


    The Melbourne University lecturer has consistently denied the accusations against her.


    She had been travelling on an Australian passport in 2018 when she was detained at Tehran airport as she tried to leave following a conference.



    Concerns for her wellbeing escalated in August when news emerged that she had been transferred to Qarchak, a notorious prison in the desert.


    On Tuesday, Dr Moore-Gilbert said it was "heartening to hear that my friends and colleagues were speaking up and hadn't forgotten me".


    "It gave me so much hope and strength to endure what had seemed like a never-ending, unrelenting nightmare," she said in a statement posted online, adding that she was "touched" and "totally blown away" by the support.


    On news of her release last week, Dr Moore-Gilbert's family said they were "relieved and ecstatic" that she was free. She arrived back in Australia on a flight to the capital, Canberra, on Friday.


    IMAGE COPYRIGHTAFP
    image captionKylie Moore-Gilbert was reported to have been on several hunger strikes while in Evin prison in Tehran

    Last Thursday, Dr Moore-Gilbert said Australian officials had worked "tirelessly" to secure her freedom. She thanked them and other supporters who had "meant the world to me" while in detention.







    The Cambridge-educated scholar - who was tried in secret - had endured "over 800 days of incredible hardship", her family said.



    "We cannot convey the overwhelming happiness that each of us feel at this incredible news," they said in a statement released by the Australian government.


    According to Iranian state media, she was exchanged for three Iranian citizens who had been detained in Thailand over a 2012 bomb plot in Bangkok, apparently aimed at Israel.


    Thai authorities, however, have not confirmed that the three Iranians were exchanged with anyone.


    'I was never a spy'


    In letters smuggled out of Tehran's Evin prison earlier this year, Dr Moore-Gilbert said she had "never been a spy" and feared for her mental health. She said she had rejected an offer from Iran to become a spy.


    "I am not a spy. I have never been a spy, and I have no interest to work for a spying organisation in any country," she wrote.


    She was later visited by Australia's ambassador to Iran, Lyndall Sachs, who reported that she was "well".



    Dr Moore-Gilbert was reported to have spent long periods in solitary confinement and undertaken hunger strikes while in detention.


    Australian Foreign Minister Marise Payne said the release "was achieved through diplomatic engagement with the Iranian government".


    Iran has detained a number of foreign nationals and Iranian dual citizens in recent years, many of them on spying charges. Human rights groups have accused Tehran of using the cases as leverage to try to gain concessions from other countries.


    British-Iranian charity worker Nazanin Zaghari-Ratcliffe was jailed on spying charges in 2016. She has always maintained her innocence.





    media captionWhy one mother's personal plight is part of a complicated history between Iran and the UK (video published August 2019 and last updated in October 2019)

    https://www.bbc.com/news/world-australia-55139933


  7. #7
    Thailand Expat tomcat's Avatar
    Join Date
    Nov 2005
    Last Online
    @
    Posts
    17,217
    Quote Originally Posted by TheRealKW View Post
    Iran has detained a number of foreign nationals and Iranian dual citizens in recent years, many of them on spying charges. Human rights groups have accused Tehran of using the cases as leverage to try to gain concessions from other countries.
    ...and yet, these folks and their ilk continue to visit Iran...they deserve their fates for such ill-considered travel...

  8. #8
    Thailand Expat Saint Willy's Avatar
    Join Date
    Aug 2019
    Last Online
    30-04-2022 @ 02:44 AM
    Posts
    11,204
    And in this particular case, her husband was Jewish/Israeli

Thread Information

Users Browsing this Thread

There are currently 1 users browsing this thread. (0 members and 1 guests)

Posting Permissions

  • You may not post new threads
  • You may not post replies
  • You may not post attachments
  • You may not edit your posts
  •