A taste of the terror that governs Iran

One day in January 2009, Roxana Saberi was finishing up interviews for the book she was working on, packing and getting ready to leave her father’s native country of Iran, where she had made her home since 2003.

The next day, her life had taken a drastic, dramatic turn: Four members of the Iranian military police showed up at her front door, ready to place her under arrest for espionage.

“I was terrified,” Saberi said — not only did she have no way of contacting her family back in Fargo, but she wasn’t sure anyone had seen her being taken from her home, so there was a possibility that no one would know what had become of her.

Over the next 100 days of her captivity at Tehran’s Evin Prison — notorious for incidents of horrific violence and torture — Saberi would learn many lessons about integrity, social responsibility, and the importance of telling the truth.

“I was not physically tortured,” Saberi told a crowd of several hundred people Tuesday night at Detroit Lakes’ Historic Holmes Theatre.

But she was not spared from mental and emotional torture.

Her captors informed her that if she did not confess to “spying for America,” they could keep her in prison for 10 to 20 years — or sentence her to death.

Meanwhile, if she confessed, they might be persuaded to release her and let her go back home.

Saberi, who had no experience with such extreme methods, eventually decided she could confess, then retract her statements as false once she found herself on safe soil again.

“I felt three main things,” she said. “Denial — I couldn’t accept reality (being imprisoned); anger (at herself, her captors, and even at God); and fear.”

She told herself, “I’m not a hero, I’m not an activist … my only cause is to be free.”

And so, she gave a false confession — something she later learned her captors had known all along was not the truth.

Her confession did not lead to her release — in fact, it was later used to incriminate her in the court trial that Saberi described as “a joke … a sham.”

And while she knew she was not guilty of the crimes of which they had accused her, the false confession made her feel “very ashamed.”

“One day, my body might be free, but because of this (confession), my conscience will remain behind bars,” Saberi realized. “I wanted to go back and change what I’d done … but I was too afraid.”

Eventually, through the courage shown by some of her fellow prisoners, Saberi was able to find it within herself as well, and renounced the confession as false. She continued to protest her innocence throughout her subsequent court trial — a 30-minute affair in which she was not given even the most basic judicial rights.

When Saberi learned of the support she was receiving, not only from friends and family back home, but from people she didn’t even know, she said she felt “so grateful, and so humbled.”

She knew she wasn’t alone in her fight anymore: “I felt empowered,” Saberi said.

She also discovered a desire “to be a voice for the voiceless.”

When she was finally freed, 100 days after her capture, Saberi said she had discovered one of life’s most important lessons:

“When we face adversity in life, if we stay true to our principals, ultimately the right path will appear,” she said.

For Saberi, that path meant using her newfound freedom “to speak out for those who can’t.”

So many people, not only in Iran but in countries all over the world, are being “punished for standing up for their principals, for basic human rights,” she said.

If nothing is done to stop this suffering, Saberi continued, the problem will spread.

“When there’s suffering in one part of a community, it can spread to another … but goodness can help overcome it —I’ve seen it,” she said.

Since her book, Between Two Worlds: My Life and Captivity in Iran, was released one year ago, Saberi has been spending much of her time giving presentations like the one that took place in Detroit Lakes on Tuesday.

She has also established a website, www.roxanasaberi.com, that provides resources for people who want to help in the fight against injustice.

Eventually, she hopes to get back to the book she was working on before she was imprisoned — a book “about how Iranians really live,” Saberi said.

And yes, she does want to return to Iran someday — just not right now.

“I really did fall in love with the country,” Saberi said, adding, “I don’t think the people who arrested (and imprisoned) me are representative of the rest of the country.”

In fact, quite the opposite, Saberi added.

Tuesday night’s free presentation at the Holmes Theatre was hosted by the Lake Agassiz Regional Library System, with funding support from the Minnesota Arts & Cultural Heritage Fund.

Source: Vicki Gerdes, DL-Online

http://www.dl-online.com/event/article/id/59634/