IRAN: Two UK students in detention in Iran

Doctoral students Mohammad Reza Jalaeipour and Ehsan Abdoh Tabrizi are both being held in detention in Iran, Radio Free Europe and The Guardian reported on 24 and 25 June.

Jalaeipour, an Iranian PhD student at the University of Oxford, was rearrested on 14 June but no reason was given by the Iranian authorities. Jalaeipour was first detained in June 2009, after the disputed presidential election in which he campaigned for opposition leader Mir Hossein Mousavi. He was detained for 80 days and his passport confiscated.

Abdoh-Tabrizi, an Iranian PhD student at Durham University, has been in prison since January when he travelled to Tehran to visit his family. He spent more than 50 days in solitary confinement and is now in poor health. He has not yet been charged but it is believed his arrest may be because his father, manager of the banned reformist newspaper Sarmayeh, is a critic of President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad.

The University of Durham has been criticised for its lack of response to the arrest.