Mr. Hedayat, based in Tabriz, the capital city of the Eastern Azarbaijan province bordering with the former Soviet republics of Azerbaijan and Armenia, was arrested on 16 January on his return to Tehran from Berlin, where he covered the meeting of Iranian Republicans.

"Mr. Heddayat covered the meeting as a free lance journalist alongside tens of other colleagues, -- who, contrary to him, had come from the United States or difference European countries --, but did not took part at the debates", sources close to the organizers told Iran Press Service.

Mr. Hedayat reached fame after writing an emotional open letter – a translation in English was published by IPS -- to President Mohammad Khatami and other Iranian officials relating the Stalinist-style circumstances of his arrest by plainclothes men during the uprising of students in Tabriz, at the same time of the protest movement in Tehran and other major cities, and the horrendous conditions of his detaintion, the endless séances of interrogations and tortures reminding the work of movie Director Costa Gavras, "Z".

As a freelance journalist covering for "Radio Farda", a farsi-language, US sponsored 24 hours radio station based in Prague, Mr. Hedayat was recently in the earthquake-stricken city of Bam, reporting about the situation there, and better than any other journalist, addressing the shortcomings of the Iranian relief missions.

"My father is a journalist. Nothing but a journalist, working strictly in the limits of the laws, dedicating all his efforts and life to the freedom of the Iranian people, to democracy, to the cause of justice and equality", Ms. Fatemeh wrote in an open letter, published before she met her father on Saturday.

In an interview with the Canada-based "Shahravand" monthly carried out in Berlin, Mr. Hedayat, describing the situation back in Iran, said, "everybody in Iran is fighting, since the people and the ruling authorities are at opposing poles of each other.

"After an article in the (now closed) newspaper "Salam", the authorities organized demonstrations against me and never allowed me to work in any paper. As I have no other profession than journalism, I had to fight, like everyone else in Iran. Between the dangerous profession of journalist and death, I went for the first one. I sold my house in Tehran and came to a one piece room in Tabriz, where in the past four years, I could not receive one single friend for lack of place", he said simply, without expressing anger.

In the past years, the Judiciary, on orders from Ayatollah Ali Khameneh’i, "awarded" by the Paris-based Reporters Sans Frontieres as "one of the most dangerous predators of press freedom in the world" have shut down more than a hundred publications and jailed a dozen of leading journalists.