Thursday, May 19, 2016

Iran: Omid Kokabee, Renowned Physicist, in Danger of Dying if Returned to Prison in Iran - UPDATE & URGENT ACTION

May 18, 2016 at 10:19 AM
       It didn’t have to be this way. A promising young physicist, beloved by his colleagues, lies in a hospital bed with just one kidney left. The other was removed because cancer had spread to the point where it was no longer salvageable. If he had only been permitted to get the treatment he needed earlier, he might still have his kidney today.        Omid Kokabee has already suffered far too much. The 33-year old scientist has been in either prison or the hospital since he was arrested in Iran more than five years ago in January 2011. After a flawed and unfair trial in an Iranian Revolutionary Court, he was sentenced to ten years in prison on absurd charges of communicating with a hostile government (ostensibly the United States). His crime? He had studied Physics in Barcelona and was doing doctoral research at the University of Texas, thereby making him a target of the Iranian security apparatus continually on the look-out for those they can claim to be traitors lured by western governments to subvert and undermine the Iranian government. Further, he was recognized as so talented, that the Iranian government had tried to recruit him to participate in that country’s nuclear program. Omid Kokabee had refused, as he intended to use his knowledge for peaceful purposes, including investigating the potential of lasers for new medical applications.
Click here for ENTIRE article.  
Click here for Amnesty International URGENT ACTION