14 Aug 13 | Iran, News and features, Politics and Society, Religion and Culture
Payam Feili (Photo: Nogaam)
Iran’s government has been increasing pressure on writers and artists over the past few years, but its heavy hand does not strike evenly.
Iranian poet Payam Feili, who is a gay man, is the victim of a brutal system. He was fired from his job, his translator’s house was ransacked, and the censors have shunned him.
Isolated in Iran, Feili has dedicated himself to writing. He says he lives among his ideas, a citizen of his mind: “I’m writing on the edge of crisis but I think I am doing fine. I’ve gotten used to life being full of tension, horror, disruption and crisis”.
Born in 1983, in Kermanshah, a city in western Iran, Feili has faced insurmountable obstacles as an author who, with pen as sword, is fighting back against social, cultural and political taboos. Despite the endorsement of renowned Iranian Simin Behbahani and the backing of one of Iran’s biggest publishers, Feili’s work has only once emerged from the Ministry of Culture and Islamic Guidance with a seal of approval.
Feili’s first book, ‘The Sun’s Platform’, was published in Iran in 2005, but dozens of other works submitted to the ministry have been refused publishing permission. Payam is blacklisted, not just for his words, but for his sexual orientation.
“They refused my books, one after the other, without any explanation. They have a blacklist of authors who are simply not allowed to publish anything. Even my apolitical non-religious works, works of pure poetry, were banned. There’s nothing scary about them, but the state authorities are afraid of everything”
Observing his sharply delicate words falling from the pages of history unread, Feili began publishing his books outside Iran, knowing all too well that he was endangering himself. Officers from the Ministry of Intelligence ransacked his translator’s house and threatened him, forcing him to sever ties with Feili. After gaining notoriety abroad, the company Feili had worked for fired him without good cause. With the odds stacked against him, Feili insists on exercising his right to freedom of speech.
“If you read my books, it’s obvious I have not succumbed to self-censorship. My poems are bold and fearless. I don’t allow anybody, not me, not others, not even the Ministry of Culture and Islamic Guidance to censor my books”
Many are hoping for Rouhani’s presidency to bring around the cultural thaw that characterised Khatami’s two terms. Feili has not been swept up by the wave of hope that has captured his peers.
“Nothing essential has changed. The structure is still the same. It’s a play, a comic and ugly performance. They’re relying on the naivety of people to be able to succeed”
Embittered by 30 years of living in exile within the borders of his country, as a homosexual, and as a writer that challenges the status quo, Feili is now dedicating his time to securing funding to translate his poetry for audiences outside Iran.
“I’ve learned a lot and I know what’s going on in Iran. I know that when my homosexual narrative is woven through my words and there is a Star of David on the cover of my book, the censors won’t even bother opening it to find out what is inside. I just want to be published. I know the audience outside Iran is different, but I just want to be heard”.
This article was reported by Nogaam, a publisher of Iranian books and authors that have been censored, banned or blacklisted. Nogaam relies on donations from readers to publish their books for free download on their website. Payam Feili’s book ‘White Field’ was first published in Persian by Nogaam in London in July 2013. The publisher is currently seeking support to help Payam translate his poems, and fulfil his simple goal of being heard.
I Will Grow, I Will Bear fruit … Figs (First Chapter)
ONE
I am twenty one. I am a homosexual. I like the afternoon sun.
My Apartment is in the outskirts of town. Near the wharf. In a place that is the realm of seashells, the realm of corals, adjacent to the eternal sorrow of the turtles.
My mother lives in the waters. In the remains of an old ship. On a bed of seaweed. Her hair blazes like a silver crown above her head. My mother is always naked. She visits me every now and then. At my apartment in the outskirts of town.
She first crosses the wharf. She floats in the scattered scents of the bazaar. Then she pays a visit to the crowd of fishermen in the seaside cafés. Among their wares, a hidden pearl. And she leaves them and heads for my bed. Of course, along this entire route, she is no less naked.
Poker; that is what I call him. He is my only friend. We met during military training. He is twenty-one. He likes the afternoon sun and he is not a homosexual.
I consider this a threat. I have never talked to anyone about my sexual inclination. In fact, I hide it. Even from my few sexual partners. With them, I pretend it is my first such experience.
My sexual partners are night prowlers. Strangers. Poker is not a night prowler. Poker is not a stranger. And this is chipping away at me from the inside!
Payam Feili
Translated from the Persian by Sara Khalili | This translation appears on Feili’s blog.
This article was originally published on 14 Aug, 2013 at indexoncensorship.org. Index on Censorship: The voice of free expression
22 Jan 13 | Uncategorized
In recent weeks, Kazakh authorities closed down almost all independent media, and gave prosecutors new, wider legal powers against free speech. Protests against these latest attacks must go hand-in-hand with the defence of prisoners of conscience such as the poet and writer Aron Atabek, say his family and friends.
They warn that Atabek’s latest sentence — two years of solitary confinement for “insubordination” to prison authorities, on top of the 18 years he is serving for “orchestrating mass disorder” — puts his life in danger.
In mid-December, as Atabek was transferred back to the Arkalyk prison in Kostanai region to serve the two years, his son Askar Aidarkhan wrote to international campaign groups urging them to protest against his ill treatment.
Since being jailed in 2007, Atabek has frequently been deprived of proper food and water, access to fresh air and sunlight, as well as access to sports facilities and writing materials. He has also had manuscripts confiscated.
Atabek became a dissident writer and political activist in Soviet times, and has been a vocal critic of Kazakh president Nursultan Nazarbayev since then. In December 1986 he participated in the Zheltoksan demonstration, the first open protest against Soviet dictatorship to be held in Kazakhstan, and afterwards campaigned for the truth about those killed when the security services broke it up.
In 1992, shortly after Kazakhstan became independent, Atabek was given political asylum in Azerbaijan after publishing opposition newspapers. He returned to Kazakhstan in 1996 and since then published novels, plays and poems as well as political articles critical of the government.
Atabek’s 18-year jail sentence was imposed in 2007 after he took up the case of shanty-town dwellers at Shanyrak outside Almaty whose homes were destroyed in a violent, illegal police operation. Twenty-three other activists and shanty-town dwellers were jailed for between one and 14 years on a variety of charges.
Atabek’s family sees a pattern of protest and reaction. In 2007, the shanty-town dwellers resisted the Almaty authorities’ attempts to destroy their community — and Atabek was punished for supporting them. In 2011, oil workers in western Kazakhstan staged nine months of strikes and protests, culminating in the massacre of 16 of them by police at Zhanaozen — and retribution has been visited on politicians and media who highlighted the strikers’ plight.
Askar Aidarkhan, Atabek’s son, has said that “what is happening in Kazakhstan now [in the aftermath of the Zhanaozen massacre] follows on from what happened at Shanyrak”.
Shanyrak became a sanctuary for homeless families during the rapid expansion of Almaty in the early 2000s. It is estimated that when it was destroyed it comprised more than 2000 dwellings with up to 10,000 residents.
The notorious clearance of Shanyrak took shortly after the promulgation on 5 July 2006 of the law “On Amnesty and Legalisation of Property”. The city authorities, citing shanty-town dwellers’ failure to register their properties correctly, ordered them to leave. Atabek and other oppositionists argued that the real reason was that the authorities wanted to make the land available to property developers.
Atabek lobbied parliamentarians, wrote articles, organised petitions and reminded the shanty-town dwellers of constitutional rights that protected them. But pleas by Atabek and other activists went unheeded. The police tried to clear the shanty-town forcibly, and a violent clash ensued in which an officer died. A round-up of activists followed.
Atabek was tried and convicted in October 2007 of “orchestrating mass disorder” — despite there being no evidence that he was nearby when the clashes occurred. He was offered a pardon in exchange for admitting guilt, but he vehemently refused.
The poet has continued to write in prison, detailing illegal and inhumane prison conditions on his website, which was set up by friends and family to whom he sent his writings. He has faced constant restrictions on visitors and had manuscripts confiscated. Before his current two-year sentence solitary, Atabek served a previous two-year period in a punishment cell (February 2010 to February 2012), for refusing to wear a prison uniform and other offences against prison rules.
Atabek’s son said in an email message to friends and supporters that his father’s health is suffering, and that he feared for his father’s life after the recent on-line publication of a book by him criticising Kazakh Nursultan Nazarbayev and other powerful figures in Kazakhstan.
07 Nov 12 | Middle East and North Africa, Tunisia
From 1 to 23 November, The International Free Expression Exchange’s (IFEX) International Day to End Impunity campaign is highlighting cases where “an individual who has been threatened, attacked or worse for expressing themselves.” In all the case the perpetrators of abuse have not been brought to account.
On the anniversary of the coup that brought President Ben Ali to power in Tunisia in 1987, IFEX is highlighting the case of Tunisian poet Mohamed Sghaier Ouled Ahmed, who was attacked by Salafists in August. Nobody has been arrested in connection with the assault.
God you were right
Kings would – as would Presidents too –
Ruin a village if they enter it
So ruin the castles that belong to Kings
To serve the villagers right
…
We all went to vote
And none voted for those who won
From the poem “Ilahi” (My God), by Sghaier Ouled Ahmed
Since Tunisia’s 2011 revolution, Tunisian poet Sghaier Ouled Ahmed has been accused of being an infidel and abusing Islam by the country’s religious leaders because of hard-hitting poems such as “Ilahi”.
In August this year, ultra-conservative Salafists took the accusations to a new level.
In a TV interview In the interview, Ahmed criticised the ruling Islamist party, Ennahda, which won elections after Ben Ali was ousted in 2011. A group of at least five Salafists were waiting outside the studio for the prominent poet to finish the interview.
As soon as Ahmed stepped out of the Tunis television station, one of the men punched him in the face. Onlookers and police stood idly by.
After the attack, he said,
I no longer recognise this government which cannot protect its citizens… No officers or officials will be saved from the bombs of my poetry and prose if they continue to turn a blind eye to such attacks.
The IFEX Tunisia Monitoring Group, a coalition of 21 IFEX members campaigning for free expression in Tunisia (including Index on Censorship), calls it an example of “old style repression in new Tunisia“. They report that attacks against journalists, artists and writers by police and ultra-conservative groups are actually on the increase since the country was freed from Ben Ali’s regime in 2011. And the new government has done nothing about them.
Find out more about Sghaier Ouled Ahmed and the International Day to End Impunity campaign here
