update: Arash and Kamiar were sentenced on January 21, 2009 to three and six years in prison respectively.

Drs. Arash and Kamiar Alaei, two brothers working on the prevention and treatment of HIV/AIDS, were detained by Iranian security forces on June 28, 2008 and were held without charge for six months until their one-day secret trial on December 31, 2008. In this trial they were charged with “communications with an enemy government” and “seeking to overthrow the Iranian government.”

The brothers helped establish a series of advanced HIV/AIDS clinics and a national HIV prevention plan. They also participated in the first US-funded people-to-people exchange with post-revolutionary Iran in 2006, visiting Tufts-New England Medical Center and other medical-related sites with a group of Iranian doctors. Kamiar, who has a Masters degree in public health from Harvard, was enrolled in a Ph.D. program at the State University of New York-Albany and was home in Iran for a summer break at the time of his arrest.

We urge our readers both to sign this online petition and to contact the Iranian Mission to the UN at +1-212-687-2020, making the following appeals:

1. Calling on the Iranian authorities to immediately release the doctors and explain in more detail the reasons for their arrest and trial;
2. Reminding the authorities that Iran is a signatory to the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, which requires the government to protect all citizens from arbitrary arrest or detention and to declare the reasons for an arrest and the charges that will be brought.
3. Seeking assurances that Iran remains committed to effective treatment and prevention of HIV as promoted by Drs Arash Alaei and Kamiar Alaei.