Hannah Shargi has always turned to her father for advice on everything from job prospects to relationships.
“He’s a great listener and a great soundboard,” Hannah, 24, tells PEOPLE. “I highly value his opinion.”
She still asks her father, Emad Sarghi, 58, what he thinks about “the big things and the little things in life,” but recently he was held in custody by the notoriously dangerous Evin of Iran. From prison to offering special advice as a father.Since 2018.
Her father is one of more than 60 U.S. citizens who have been wrongfully detained abroad, and their families are working around the clock to bring them home.
“These people were taken because they are Americans,” said Neda Shagi, 50, Hannah’s aunt and Emad’s sister, after the American-Iranian businessman served a 10-year prison term. He has vigorously demanded that he be released from Tehran prison where he is accused of spying.
After fighting alone for a long time, Neda, along with Emad’s wife Bahare, 56, and two daughters, Ariana, 26, and Hannah, lobby the U.S. government to release all American detainees or hostages. I participated in the campaign. go back home.
“They are just normal Americans living normal lives, unfortunately embroiled in problems that have nothing to do with them, but a bigger, broader problem. ‘ she says.
For more information about Emad Sargi and other Americans detained abroad, visit JOIN PEOPLE NOW Or grab this week’s issue on our newsstands.
Families participating in the campaign are thrilled with fellow members of former Marine Trevor Reed, 30, and WNBA star Britney Greiner, who were released from prison in Russia earlier this year.
The goal now is “to encourage our government and our administration to use all the tools available to them and take them all home,” says Neda. There are limits to what one person can do.”
taken in the middle of the night
Emad was arrested while he and his wife were visiting family and touring Iran.
“My brother and sister-in-law were burglarized and decided to visit my sister-in-law’s family and reunite them with the country they weren’t born and raised in,” he explains. Neda.
Their trip was not what they expected.
At around 2:30 am on April 23, 2018, Emad and Bahale were at their mother’s house in Iran when they heard a commotion outside, Redha says.
Members of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps climbed the walls of the compound and stormed the house, Neda said.
They walked around the house for hours. “It’s not clear what they were looking for or why they were there,” she says.
Without explanation, they took Emad away.
“It was just terrifying,” says Neda.
“Having to tell my daughters that this happened to their father was one of the worst experiences of my life,” she says.
Ariana is preparing to graduate from college and Hannah has just started college and her father has dragged her out.
After eight agonizing months, Emad was released and told that all charges against him had been cleared. However, he was forced to wait in Iran until authorities returned his passport so he could return to Washington, D.C.
It never happened.
Just as suddenly as he was released, Neda says he learned that he had been ordered back to court, convicted in absentia of espionage charges, and sentenced to 10 years in prison.
Hannah says she felt sick when she found out he was convicted.
“I was just like, ‘How is this going to be real? My dad isn’t doing anything. How is this happening to us?'”
Hannah last saw her father five years ago in December 2017, when she and her family celebrated Christmas together in Iran.
“It’s like almost a fifth of my life and he wasn’t here, he wasn’t in my life and couldn’t give me guidance.
She calls her father “best friend”.
Her father has missed anniversaries, birthdays and graduations.
“The fact that he’s missed so many important moments in our lives is really hard for us, but definitely harder for him,” she says.
“I think that’s weighing on him and making him feel guilty.” They are just trying to live a normal life and are being used.
“I just want my dad to go home,” she says.
