17 Bahais in Yazd arrested, and later released

Bahai News (Persian), August 4, 2016, and updates

In recent days, seventeen Baha’is in Yazd were arrested in raids on homes, conducted without a search warrant. Security agents climbed over the gate of a house in Yazd belonging to Mr. Sahil Rouhani-Fard and Mr. Azzatullah Khorram (سهیل روحانی فرد و عزت الله خرم). They arrested all those present (the number is not stated), and searched the house. Mr. Rouhani-Fard was previously imprisoned for two years because of his Bahai beliefs.

During the following night they raided the home of two other Bahais and arrested them. The arrested Bahais were interrogated and released within a few hours, except that

Gold News reports that on the morning of August 8, security forces in Yazd simultaneously raided the home and workplace of Mr. Mehran Bandi (مهران بندی), a Bahai whose home was raided in February 2014, and who was previously imprisoned for three and a half years, and exiled for three and a half years, because of his Bahai beliefs. The agents seized books, computers, a satellite receiver, mobile phone and images of Bahai sacred places. Mr. Bandi has been told to report to Bureau of Public Places in Yazd today, August 9, along with his son.

They also raided the home of Mr. Mashallah Shadepour (ماشاالله شادپور) [during the day]. Because his wife was not at home, they went to his work place. After searching that, they took him with him to his home and searched it. Mr. Shadepour’s elderly mother, Mrs. Safa Zarandeyun (خانم صفا زرندیون) is not able to walk, and for that reason had not opened the door for the agents.

The agents also went to a downstairs apartment used by Mr. Shadepour’s aunt, Mrs. Ridvan Shadepour (رضوان شادپور), and searched it. She is the wife of the Ali Motahari (علی مطهری), a member of the Local Spiritual Assembly of the Bahais of Yazd, who was executed for his Bahai beliefs on September 8, 1980. Their daughter, Mrs. `Azam Motahari (اعظم مطهری) is now serving a one-year sentence in the central prison of Yazd.

The sequence of events and scale of the raids is not entirely clear from these reports. A Facebook report from Bahai News states that Sahil Rouhani-Fard and Mr. Azzatullah Khorram were freed from detention on August 4. It is possible that a number of their friends visited them to congratulate them on their release, and the raids followed this gathering.