Dorothy Parvaz is freed
COMMENTARY | May 138, 2011
Al Jazeera reporter Dorothy Parvaz, who had been held in Syria and Iran for almost three weeks is now safe in Doha, Qatar. She has been in touch with her Nieman Fellow colleagues to say all is well and to thank all who helped keep her name in the news during her detention.
Nieman curator Bob Giles said, “The Nieman Foundation is profoundly grateful to the Nieman family and the community of journalists and friends around the world who rallied to the cause of freeing Dorothy and who effectively spread the word in ways that may have helped bring a happy ending to her custody.”
Parvaz was detained by Syrian officials at the Damascus airport on April 29 while on assignment for Al Jazeera. Syria later issued a statement saying Parvaz was deported to Iran on May 1, but Iranian officials had not confirmed that she was in the country. Parvaz is a citizen of Iran, Canada and the United States.
During the time she detained, she was not allowed any contact with the outside world. She landed in Doha, Qatar, on May 18 on a flight from Iran.
An Al Jazeera spokesman said: "I'm delighted to let you know that Dorothy Parvaz has been released and is safe and well and back with us in Doha. She has been in contact with her family, and we are with her now to find out more about her ordeal over the last nineteen days."
Her fiancé, Todd Barker, posted on Facebook: "She is safe in Doha and will be coming to Vancouver BC soon. We can't wait to see her."
Barker was with Parvaz's family when he heard the news. Parvaz will be travelling as soon as possible to meet them all.
"We are grateful to the Iranian officials that she was treated well, and she confirmed that," Barker, who is planning on marrying Parvez this summer, told Al Jazeera.
He thanks US and Canadian officials, the Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ), the international Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) and all of those who had rallied in support of his fiancée.
Barker said he was grateful to Al Jazeera for the network's efforts to obtain Parvaz's release.
"It's been a pleasure working with them, as much as it can be," he said. "They were working like nobody's business on it and we're just ecstatic."
Dorothy is an experienced journalist who joined Al Jazeera in 2010.
She graduated from the University of British Columbia, completed a masters degree in Arizona, and held journalism fellowships at both Harvard and Cambridge. She previously worked as a columnist and feature writer for the Seattle Post-Intelligencer.
