Last year, as the United Nations General Assembly (UNGA) came to an end and Iranian President Rouhani travelled home, American Amir Hekmati was notified that the Iranian Supreme Court would be hearing his case. This was great news. Citing insufficient evidence, an appellate court had already thrown out the conviction of espionage, waging war against god, and corrupting the earth and the death sentence that came with it. His family felt that now Iranian judicial officials would look at the alternative conviction handed to him - a 10 year prison sentence for cooperating with a hostile country - and release him on time served as they had for other Westerners convicted of the same charge in Iran. Amir traveled to Iran as a tourist and committed no crime.
When American Amir Hekmati went missing in Iran a few days before he was to return home to Michigan, it was not confirmed until three months later that he had been arrested and taken to Evin prison. A month later, in December of 2011, after a forced and false confession was aired on Iranian state television, his family had learned he was being charged as a spy. His family found while watching the news with the rest of the world that Amir had been convicted of espionage and sentenced to death. This was the first death sentence given to an American in over thirty years.
For his family, this is personal. It is their son and brother, a man who speaks three languages, loves learning about finance, and found peace in running miles each day. Amir is a man that is devoted to his family - a devotion that led to this trip to Iran, his first, to visit his ailing and elderly grandmother and one who shows more concern for his dying father than his own situation imprisoned in Iran. Amir is not only devoted to his family, but also to his country, previously serving as a U.S. Marine.
Amir's family is not a political family. For them, this is not a political or partisan issue, but a humanitarian issue. Despite the tangled web Amir has found himself in between the United States and Iran, his family has attempted to work diplomatically with both the United States and Iran to secure his release and return home. Using back channels, they have attempted to speak with Iranian officials, but limited access has made it difficult for the family to get the answers they need. They simply want to know how the United States can be considered a hostile government by Iran when the countries have spent the last several years negotiating with one another and these two countries are not at war and why, in a time where diplomatic relations exist between these two countries, other Westerners charged with the same time when diplomatic relations did not exist were freed and allowed to return home.
The difference between Amir and other Westerners previous detained in Iran is that they were not imprisoned while negotiations for an Iranian nuclear deal were taking place. In November, when negotiations for the framework agreement for the p5+1 failed to come to pass, the Iranian Supreme Court dropped Amir's case. While Amir himself has stated he did not want to be a part of the nuclear deal, emphasizing that he is an innocent man that committed no crime and does not want to be a part of a foreign policy that set a precedent for Iran to continue to detain Iranian-Americans traveling to Iran, it is clear that certain individuals from both countries have made Amir's imprisonment political.
Now, four years after Amir has sat behind the walls of Evin Prison, stripped of his dignity, due process, and human rights, he has been imprisoned in Iran longer than any American in history. By Iranian law, Amir could be released by pardon for humanitarian reasons, through amnesty since he has served over a third of his sentence, or be given a conditional release. Last year during UNGA, Amir's father wrote President Rouhani a letter, father-to-father, urging him to help free Amir. This year, Amir's father's health has deteriorated to the point he is now in assisted living. He has no memory of the letter he sent only a year ago. The father Amir left behind in 2011 spoke four languages, was a college professor, and an independent man who did things on his own. He now receives around the clock care for the ordinary things you and I take for granted. As the Iranian delegation arrives in New York for UNGA, we urge them to follow their own laws and release Amir.