A Saanich man jailed in Iran for 11 years is back in Canada today, free.
Saeed Malekpour, 44, had languished in Tehran’s notorious Evin prison since 2008, when he was locked up on what his supporters call trumped-up, politically motivated charges.
Although his story became a cause celebre, with the likes of Amnesty International and former Canadian justice minister Irwin Cotler fighting on his behalf, many doubted Malekpour would ever see the light of day again.
That he finally did walk free is being credited to the unrelenting efforts of his younger sister, Maryam Malekpour, who advocated for her brother so strenuously that she had to flee to Canada from Iran in 2012 to avoid her own arrest.
It was Maryam who broke the news of Saeed’s release in a tweet from Vancouver: “My brother Saeed Malekpour has just arrived to Canada! The nightmare is finally over! Thank you Canada for your leadership. And thank you to every single person who supported us throughout this time. Together we prevailed.”
How Saeed made it to Vancouver is unclear. Neither he nor Maryam were ready to talk Saturday. Saeed’s international lawyer, Kimberly Motley, would only confirm that he had been furloughed from prison July 21. She said the details of what happened next would have to remain “hush-hush.”
Saeed, a web programmer, came to Canada in 2004 with his wife, Fatima Eftekhari, who wanted to study in the West. Eventually, they gained permanent-resident status. In 2006, they moved to Victoria, where he freelanced as a website designer and she finished her doctorate in medical nanotechnology and taught at UVic.
They were keen on the outdoors, skiing Mount Washington, swimming the Sooke Potholes, strolling Cadboro Bay beach, hiking Mount Doug. Their Saanich landlords described the couple as friendly, fun-loving, compassionate and helpful, the kind of tenants who would shovel the driveway unbidden, or help in the garden. They said Saeed was gregarious, friendly, compassionate and helpful.
By 2008, Saeed had plans to take his master’s degree at UVic. That dream was dashed that October when, after returning to Iran to be with his dying father, he was arrested on pornography charges.
His supporters say those accusations were ludicrous. All he had done was design open-source photo-sharing software that was used, without his knowledge, to upload porn. The real story, they said, is that the Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps -- the muscle behind Iran’s clerical regime -- was worried about growing internet and social-media use by young people, and wanted a means to intimidate them.
The international digital-rights group Electronic Frontier Foundation put it this way: “Arresting a coder living in the West and accusing them of being a foreign spy running a Persian language porn network was intended to paint the ‘Net as a channel for corrupt Western influence - and to demonstrate that no one, not even coders living in a foreign country, could escape punishment.”
Saeed was thrown into Evin prison, beaten, kept in solitary confinement for a year and tortured into a forced confession - one he recanted in a letter smuggled out of prison. He was sentenced to death in 2010, but that was commuted to life two years later. His marriage collapsed.
Maryam was able to speak to her imprisoned brother by phone. In a 2015 interview, she said he told her that during his year in solitary confinement he would escape inside his head, closing his eyes and picturing his life on Vancouver Island. “You have to go to Victoria,” he told her.
Maryam, who found work as a project coordinator for a Vancouver construction firm, never stopped campaigning for her brother’s freedom, though she would occasionally admit that it was a lonely, tiring crusade.
Motley, speaking from Charlotte, North Carolina, heaped praise on Maryam: “She has never wavered in her fight for her brother. We should all be so lucky to have a sister like that.”
What happens to Saeed next is uncertain, Motley said. “I think his plans are just to adjust back to life and get over the trauma of being in prison for 11 years.”
