"We want to show that Benjamin Brière exists, that it is not a sleeping hostage waiting for it to happen".
Worried, powerless, the relatives of this French tourist, detained in Iran since May 2020, are organizing a support rally on Saturday January 8, Place du Trocadéro, in Paris, so that he is released.
"There is no valid element to keep it where it is", insists her sister, Blandine Brière, contacted by France 24. "It is kidnapping".
Benjamin Brière, 36, had left in a van, crisscrossing the roads of Iran as he had done earlier in Scandinavia, the Balkans and Turkey.
His journey ended twenty months ago, when he was arrested by Iranian security forces in a desert area on the border between Iran and Turkmenistan.
He is accused of having taken "photographs of prohibited areas" with a recreational drone in a natural park and of having questioned, via a post on social networks, about the compulsory wearing of the Islamic veil for Iranian women .
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Detained since in the Vakilabad prison of Mashhad, in the north-east of the country, he is accused of "espionage" and "propaganda" against the political system of the Islamic Republic of Iran.
Charges punishable by several years in prison, and up to the death penalty for espionage.
However, so far, still no legal proceedings.
"No court has been seized, explains his sister. There are just these two accusations which fell to the ears of the lawyer".
The latter - Saeid Dehghan, also lawyer for the Franco Iranian researcher Fariba Adelkhah, under house arrest in Tehran for almost two years - denounced this situation on December 27 on Twitter.
"What is the Mashhad Revolutionary Tribunal waiting for to study the political charges against Benjamin Brière, who has been held in detention for 570 days?"
ظاهرا مهم نیست که یک توریست خارجی دومین # کریسمس خود را در زندان‌های ایران می‌گذراند.
اما او بخاطر محرومیت از تماس با خانواده برای این مناسبت ، دست به # اعتصاب_غذا زده است.
دادگاه انقلاب مشهد برای رسیدگی به اتهامات سیاسیِ # بنجامین_بریر که اکنون ۵۷۰ روز در بازداشت است ،نتظر چی
pic.twitter.com/m6zQsD9thl
- Saeid Dehghan (@vakilroaya) December 27, 2021
"We have no file, it is completely obscure", deplores Blandine Brière, who considers that her brother is today "a hostage of the Iranian authorities".
Psychological distress
"He is only a tourist and nothing justifies the fact of spending so much time in prison without reason and with so little contact with his family", continues the young woman of 31 years.
News from her brother, she has about every three weeks, when the authorities on the spot want it, she says.
"It's a continuous fight."
When permitted, their rare conversations are recorded and then translated [into Persian].
So much so that it is impossible for Benjamin Brière to speak freely about what he experiences on a daily basis.
Psychological torture, non-transmitted letters, recorded conversations ... On December 25, from his prison, he then began a hunger strike to protest against his conditions of detention after the authorities refused to let him communicate with his prisoner. family for the end of year celebrations.
If the consul's visits (authorized under the consular protection he enjoys by virtue of the Vienna Convention of April 24, 1963) make it possible to ensure the absence of physical ill-treatment, his relatives are worried, on the other hand, of the psychological distress in which Benjamin Brière has been for over a year and a half.
"From time to time we allow him the phone calls, from time to time, no. Around him, nobody speaks neither French nor English, so he fights every day to try to communicate", abounds his sister, which also evokes the fear of Benjamin facing the fate of his fellow prisoners sentenced to death.
"He hears and understands what's going on around him. He's in a scary atmosphere, and it creates trauma."
In its efforts, the family of Benjamin Brière is assisted by Saeid Dehghan, who works in collaboration with a colleague on site.
In France, a lawyer also helps them in their contacts with the government and the management of diplomatic letters.
Last May, Blandine Brière wrote an open letter to President Emmanuel Macron, asking him to "use all possible diplomatic means to obtain [his] release".
No answer.
In constant contact with the Foreign Ministry, the latter does not wish to blame anyone, she said.
"The Quai d'Orsay is doing what it can as much as possible for Benjamin. I know they are doing what they can. It's just that for us, after twenty months, it's not enough ".
"Shout out loud that this is a misunderstanding"
Benjamin Brière is the only known westerner detained in Iran who does not have an Iranian passport.
To date, more than a dozen Western passport holders, mostly dual nationals, are detained in Iran.
A situation condemned by the NGOs, which evoke a hostage-taking policy intended to obtain concessions from foreign powers.
In recent years, the Islamic Republic has carried out several exchanges of detainees with foreign countries.
Franco-Iranian researcher Fariba Adelkhah has been detained since June 2019 and was sentenced, in May 2020, to five years in prison for attacks on national security.
She has been under house arrest since October 2020.
Her companion Roland Marchal, also a researcher, had been detained with her, before being released in March 2020, after Paris freed Iranian engineer Jallal Rohollahnejad, whose extradition the United States demanded for violating American sanctions against Iran.
"We want to cry out loud and clear that this is a misunderstanding," says Blandine Brière, who repeats that her brother is absolutely not a spy, but a simple tourist.
"He used a drone, but we are talking about a drone bought 100 euros on the Internet. That does not justify all that", she continues.
Helpless in the face of such a situation over which she has no control, she will be on the Place du Trocadéro on Saturday to rally around the cause of her brother.
An online petition has also been launched, in which Blandine Brière recalls that he is illegally detained, the Iranian justice still not having decided which court will try him.
Addressed to Emmanuel Macron, the text has already collected nearly 44,000 signatures.
"We are completely helpless," concludes the young woman.
"We are ordinary people who ask for help from whomever will listen."
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