Iran Kidnaps Another American Citizen
October 24, 2008 - by Nicholas Guariglia
[excerpt]
Esha Momeni is a young Iranian-American woman and a graduate student at California State University-Northridge. She is a member of Change for Equality’s California chapter, an Iranian women’s organization which focuses on women’s rights, or lack thereof, in Iran.
Esha, who was born in Los Angeles and grew up in California, traveled back to Iran a few months ago to complete her thesis research project. On October 15, just a little over a week ago, Esha was arrested by Iranian security officials for “unlawfully passing another vehicle while driving,” and thrown into the notorious and brutal detention system known as Evin prison — a series of damp, dark cells with dungeon-like conditions, reserved not merely for legitimate criminals, but for Iranian dissidents and political prisoners. Evin is managed by Iran’s infamously deviant Intelligence Ministry.
Anyone who has survived Evin’s penitentiary system, like my friend Amir Abbas Fakhravar, can attest that the routine beatings and solitary confinement are hard to endure. The regime gives its political prisoners a treatment known as “white torture,” a strenuous process whereby prisoners are dressed in white, in an all-white room, with bright, white lights for days, weeks, and months.