Zabihpour, Ameneh Sadat

"Ali Rezvani (Rezvani) and Ameneh Sadat Zabihpour (Zabihpour) are IRIB 'interrogator-journalists' who are both being designated pursuant to E.O. 13846 for having acted or purported to act for or on behalf of, directly or indirectly, IRIB, a person whose property and interests in property are blocked pursuant to E.O. 13628, which was revoked and superseded by E.O. 13846. Furthermore, both have cooperated with the MOIS and the IRGC Intelligence Organization in extracting and airing forced confessions in the style of documentaries. Both feature prominently in the IRIB’s notorious 8:30 broadcast, which regularly airs forced confessions... Zabihpour, as the head of the foreign Persian language media group at IRIB, also has a long history of direct involvement in the broadcast of coerced confessions of dual nationals, civil society activists, political prisoners, writers, and religious minorities. In 2017, Zabihpour produced and helped broadcast for IRIB a documentary-style program that attempted to portray Nazanin Zaghari Ratcliff[e], a British-Iranian woman held prisoner by the IRGC on charges of 'collaborating with foreign institutions” and “participating in the soft overthrow of the government,' as a spy. Zabihpour was also directly involved in the interrogation of three labor activists in 2019, which resulted in forced confessions broadcast as part of a film called 'Burnt Plot.' One of the activists arrested stated that Zabihpour was in the interrogation room to prepare a text to be read in front of the camera after hours of physical and mental torture. Recently, Zabihpour’s programming has targeted the Iranian Baha’i community in tandem with nationwide raids on Baha’i homes conducted by MOIS and other Iranian security forces. As part of the crackdown, MOIS agents entered a kindergarten and handed out Baha’i materials to teachers, who were then forced to say on camera that the materials had been distributed by Baha’is. Zabihpour produced a staged documentary style broadcast called “Detention of a Number of Central Members of the Baha’i Espionage Party,” in which she narrates about 'unauthorized Baha’i kindergartens,' falsely incriminating Iranian Baha’is for infiltrating kindergartens. Zabihpour was also instrumental in producing the November 2019 and July 2022 forced confession videos of Fatemeh Davand, a protester detained during the November 2019 protests, and Sepideh Rashnu, a 28-year-old writer who was arrested in July 2022 for opposing mandatory hijab."¹

"Ameneh Sadat Zabihpour is the head of the foreign Persian-language media group at IRIB, which is notorious for being a regime mouthpiece. IRIB severely restricts and denies the free flow of information to the Iranian people. Furthermore, IRIB is actively involved in organising and broadcasting forced 'confessions' of regime critics, obtained through intimidation and severe violence. These 'confessions' are often aired following public protests, or prior to an execution as a means of reducing public backlash. Whereas several high-profile state broadcasting personnel have resigned recently and disavowed the Iranian regime’s violent response to the 2022 protests, Zabihpour continues to act in her position. She has interrogated critics of the regime and produced forced confession videos. She is therefore responsible for serious human rights violations in Iran."²

Sources: 

1. https://home.treasury.gov/news/press-releases/jy1109

2. https://eur-lex.europa.eu/legal-content/EN/TXT/PDF/?uri=OJ:L:2022:318I:FULL&from=EN