Following the publication of an interview with Mostafa Kavakebian, a former Iranian MP, claiming that a letter from President Masoud Pezeshkian to Donald Trump was sent through Saudi Arabia’s mediation, the Iranian Judiciary has filed criminal charges against Kavakebian and the news outlets and newspapers that published the interview.
The CEO of Mizan News Agency, affiliated with Iran’s Judiciary, announced that the Tehran Public Prosecutor’s Office has filed charges against Mostafa Kavakebian, the managing editor of the daily Mardom Salari, the news and analysis website Asr Iran, and a number of other newspapers.
Earlier, in a video interview with Asr Iran, Mostafa Kavakebian had stated that the letter from Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian to Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman contained a message intended for Donald Trump, the President of the United States. In part of the interview, Kavakebian said: “The content of Pezeshkian’s message to Trump was that ‘we are ready to sit down and talk with each other—not talks based on surrender or you dictating what should or should not be—but to sit down and open the door to dialogue.'”
The interview triggered widespread reactions among Iranian media and officials. Esmaeil Baghaei, spokesman for Iran’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs, responded by stating that the content of the president’s letter to the Saudi Crown Prince was “a completely routine correspondence exclusively concerning Hajj affairs, and contained no mention whatsoever of negotiation-related topics.”
Numerous media outlets, including several Tehran-based newspapers (Shargh, Kargozaran Sazandegi, Ham-Mihan, Arman-e Emrooz, Etemad, Arman-e Melli, and others), featured Kavakebian’s remarks on their front pages—an action that has led the Judiciary to open legal cases against these publications.
The filing of criminal charges by the prosecutor’s office against media outlets, media activists, and journalists is a recurring pattern of suppressing freedom of expression in Iran—a pattern that has escalated sharply following controversial events in the country.