Biography
According to an article in Front Page Magazine, a conservative online political magazine, Fakhravar was born on July 6, 1975 in the capital city of Tehran, Iran. His father "Mohammad-Bagher Fakhravar" was an officer in the Iranian Air Force and his mother "Parvaneh Pir-Dehghan" had a lot of influence on him for his future success. He delivered his first political speech at the age of 17, in 1993, while a senior in high school. The speech was directed to Ayatollah Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani after which he was arrested. Fakhravar received his high school diploma in Mathematics and Physics in city of Shiraz. In December 1994 he gave another speech while attending medical school in Iran’s Orumiya province. He was arrested and sentenced to a three year jail term which was later partially suspended. He was also suspended for two semesters and later transferred to Bushehr University of Medical Sciences. In 1997 he published his first book titled "سبزترین چشم زمین" (Sabztarin Cheshme Zamin, The Greenest Eyes on Earth). Fakhravar was on the frontline of the Iran student protests, July 1999. Fakhravar was a writer and a columnist for two banned and pro-reform dallies, Khordad and Mosharekat. Khordad (newspaper) was closed in November 1999, and its chief editor Abdollah Noori sentenced to 5 years imprisonment. Mosharekat was closed during closure of 17 reformist newspapers in April 2000. Amir Abbas was arrested while with his sister, Mahlagha Fakhravar, during student uprising on August 2000 and sent to Evin Prison. Later that year Fakhravar was taken from his home on December 31 by five men in civilian clothing to the Evin prison and tortured heavily until he had to be transferred to "Ghamar-e Bani Hashem" hospital in Tehran for emergency treatment.
In November 2007, Fakhravar received the Annie Taylor Journalism Award. Fakhravar is the author of three books, an honorary member of English PEN, PEN Canada, and International PEN.
A number of prominent Iranian political prisoners, including some who shared the same cell as Fakhravar in jail, have argued that Fakhravar was not in fact a leader of the student movements in 1999 and have accused him of spying for the Iranian government while in jail and exaggerating his story of escape. These critics include Bina Darab-Zand, an imprisoned human rights activist; Nasser Zarafshan, an Iranian human rights attorney and former Evin detainee who shared a cell with Fakhavar; Nasrin Mohammadi, the sister of Akbar Mohammadi, the political dissident who died in Evin prison while on hunger strike; Mohsen Sazegara, an Iranian dissent who was also imprisoned in Iran; Najmeh Bozorgmehr, the Financial Times' Tehran correspondent who closely followed the 1999 pro-democracy Tehran; and Ahmad Batebi, another prominent political dissident who is pictured with Fakhravar in Evin.
Fakhravar and his supporters vehemently deny these allegations, saying that the attacks are motivated by petty jealousy and a vendetta by Fakhravar’s enemies on the Iranian left.
Read more about this topic: Amir-Abbas Fakhravar
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