He says that when he was first summoned for interrogation, it struck him as odd that the chair in the interrogation cell had no backrest. The reason soon became clear: “There was no backrest so that they could conveniently hit and kick people’s backs,” Hellwig told The Associated Press in his first interview with international media.
The 46-year-old reporter for Germany’s mass-circulation Bild am Sonntag was arrested with his photographer after entering Iran on a tourist visa in October 2010 and interviewing the son of Sakineh Mohammadi-Ashtiani, an Iranian woman sentenced to death by stoning for adultery.
Hellwig and photographer Jens Koch were split up and Hellwig said he was initially thrown into a plain 65 square foot (6 square meter) cell kept brightly lit 24 hours a day, but without a window or toilet. There was no furniture, only a carpet to lie on.
Hellwig said he was held in a facility run by the Pasdaran (Revolutionary Guard) and heard “terrifying cries” of inmates being abused every day.
“I was scared to death. Knowing that I was in a Pasdaran prison, with no lawyer or diplomatic assistance, outside of the official judicial system, they could have done anything to me,” he said. “This total insecurity was the worst — physical pain heals after a couple of hours.”
Hellwig’s book “Inshallah. Captive in Iran,” was being released in German Friday. There are no plans yet for an English edition.
He said his jailers kept constant pressure on him, initially taking him several times a day to the tiny interrogation cell, asking him the same questions, alleging at times that he was a spy or a terrorist. He consistently told them that he was only a journalist, but they beat him and urged him to cooperate or endure more suffering, he said.
“They ask you nice questions and then … all of a sudden, boom, you get hit a first time, then comes the next hit. It’s all about breaking you,” he said.
“They don’t give you options, they give you the feeling they can do whatever they want.”
Every day except Friday, Hellwig heard the cries of other inmates being tortured even more severely.
“It started in the morning with toned-down cries, then loud, terrifying cries,” he said. “Never before in my entire life had I heard men capable of such cries.”
In his book, Hellwig describes being tortured with electric shocks. In one instance, a prison guard forced him to sit on a steel table before he came back with a cart loaded with batteries and cables.
“The man comes very close to me with the cart, takes a cable and puts it up to my lips. Then I pass out,” Hellwig writes.
Another day and another visit to the interrogation cell and “a powerful shock goes through my body. There is a thunderbolt, it races through my jaw, spreads frantically over my scalp, than back into the ears. Thundering pain.”
In the interview, Hellwig said he still found much of the torture too difficult to talk about. “In the book, I went as far and as close as I can without inflicting too much pain on myself,” he said.
Hellwig and photographer Koch — who has not spoken to media since their release — were eventually found guilty of committing unspecified acts against Iran’s national security. But a court then threw out the journalists’ 20-month prison sentence, commuting it to a $50,000 fine.
The two journalists were finally freed last February after German Foreign Minister Guido Westerwelle traveled to Tehran for a rare meeting with Iranian President Ahmadi-nejad and brought the pair home on his government plane. German officials said Iran had required Wester-welle’s visit and photo op with Ahmadi-nejad as a condition for freeing the pair.
Hellwig defended the German government, saying it made no compromises on human rights. “Germany’s foreign policy on Iran hasn’t changed by an iota,” Hellwig said. “Wester-welle discussed human rights violations with the Iranians during his talks.”
After he got home to Berlin, Hellwig said it was difficult for him to return to his normal life.
“I had great difficulties coping with the speed of things and all the impressions here again,” he said. “For some time, I couldn’t even fall asleep without light.”