Ali Reza Panah, the Iranian refugee detained without trial for 20 months, has reportedly been granted bail:
A hunger-striking Iranian man who faces deportation from New Zealand has been granted bail.I guess the government realised that if he died, people were going to lay the corpse on their doorstep.Ali Panah has been on hunger strike for 53 days in protest against efforts to deport him to Iran, where he says he will be persecuted due to his conversion to Christianity.
[...]
Mr Panah was this afternoon released on bail at a hearing in North Shore District Court, Radio New Zealand reported.
The Department of Labour did not oppose his release.
Mr Panah was given strict bail conditions by the court including that he is to stay at his vicar's house and he is to resume eating.
This is good news, but its not victory. That will only come when we cease our indefensible practice of indefinite detention without trial and accept our human rights obligation not to return converts to religious persecution in Iran. There are still two more Iranian converts who have been similarly detained - one of them for over two years. Isn't it time we released them too?
