Ebrahim Yazdi

Ebrahim Yazdi (* 1931 in Qazvin, Persian ابراهیم یزدی ) since 1995 Secretary General of the Iran Freedom Movement, which is considered in some camps of the Iranian government as " illegal party " and was banned in 2002.

Yazdi studied pharmacology at the University of Tehran. After the Islamic revolution in Iran, he served as deputy prime minister and foreign minister in the interim government of Mehdi Bazargan until his resignation in the wake of the hostage-taking in Tehran in 1979.

Life

After the military coup of 1953, in consequence of the government of Mohammad Mossadegh was deposed, Yazdi joined the " National Resistance Movement of Iran " at; in this underground organization, he was active until 1960. The movement turned against the Shah Reza Pahlavi. Yazdi traveled in 1960 to the United States in order to continue his training; and there he remained politically active against the Shah. He was together with Mostafa Chamran, Ali Shariati, and Sadegh Ghotbzadeh in 1961, founding member of the Freedom Movement.

Because of his activities, it was not possible to return him to Iran and so he remained in the United States until the Islamic Revolution in 1979. In 1975, Yazdi was convicted by a Iranian military court in absentia to a prison sentence of ten years, with the arrangement of its arrest if they returned to Iran.

Yazdi was ultimately up to the November 6, 1979 briefly foreign minister in the interim government Bāzargāns, and therefore the first Foreign Minister of the Islamic Republic of Iran.

In December 1997, Yazdi was arrested on the basis of unknown charges and held in Evin prison in Tehran. After his release, he was prohibited for many years, to leave the country; Moreover, he was regularly summoned to the Islamic Revolutionary Court, to answer questions, where he was the lawyer and later Nobel Peace Prize winner Shirin Ebadi to the side.

Arrests in 2009 and 2010

According to the website of the Iran Freedom Movement Yazdi was arrested in the context of the protests after the Iranian presidential election on June 17, 2009, while he underwent medical tests in a Tehran hospital. On 22 June, he was again released to return to the hospital for a medical procedure. 28 December 2009 Yazdi was arrested in the wake of renewed protests again.

Yazdi was arrested a second time on October 1, 2010, while he participated in Isfahan on an "illegal Friday prayers ". Other participants, who were also arrested were released unlike Yazdi within a few days. In February 2011, Yazdi was still in " temporary custody ".