'HIV Physicians Imprisoned in Iran'

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U.S. State Department officials say they believe two Iranian physicians who work with HIV and AIDS patients in the country have been arrested and accused of attempting to destabilize Iran’s conservative, Islamic government.

Brothers Kamiar and Arash Alaei, graduates of Harvard University’s School of Public Health, were arrested in June. Although they were not formally charged yet with a crime, the State Department believes the men were detained because of their close ties with U.S. medical professionals and nongovernmental agencies fighting HIV in the Middle East. Some officials have even suggested that the men were arrested because they were seen as becoming too close with the West.

"The Iranian government is paranoid about any contract with foreigners," Maziar Bahari, a London-based Iranian filmmaker who made a BBC documentary in 2004 featuring the brothers' work, told The Boston Globe. “These brothers should not be in prison. They were not trying to overthrow the government."

An Iranian official told the Globe he had no details on the Alaei brothers, but he did call their HIV and AIDS work in the country “shameful.” The brothers established a series of HIV clinics in the country, developed a national HIV prevention and treatment plan, and developed collaborative relationships with many U.S. HIV treatment experts.