Siamak Pourzand

Siamak Pourzand, (aged 74), Head of Majmue-ye Farhangi-ye Honari-ye Tehran (The Tehran Artistic and Cultural Centre) and an occasional newspaper correspondent, is a prisoner of conscience. He is serving an 11 year sentence imposed after a grossly unfair and politically motivated trial in connection with oral statements he allegedly made about Iran’s political leaders; Amnesty International fears that the activities of his wife, Mehrangiz Kar, a human rights defender currently outside Iran, may have exacerbated the treatment of Siamak Pourzand."

His wife received the 2002 Democracy Award from the National Endowment for Democracy. One of the first recipients of the award was ironically Violeta Chamorro. She has also "served a fellow at the National Endowment for Democracy, the Woodrow Wilson Center, the American University in Washington DC, the University of Virginia in Charlottesville and Columbia University." 

Mehrangiz Kar has also contributed a chapter in an NED book edited by Larry Diamond and is on the Board of Advisors for the Persian Cultural Foundation.