TEHRAN, Jan 10: Global press rights watchdog Reporters Without Borders (RSF) has urged Iranian authorities to release 11 journalists, arguing that most of them are in appalling health.

"It is completely unacceptable for journalists like Siamak Pourzand, who is sick and 74-years-old, to be still held in solitary confinement," RSF's secretary general, Robert Menard, said in a statement.

"The same goes for Ali-Reza Jabari, 60, who suffers from heart problems and has even received 253 lashes. The journalists' families are not even allowed to bring warm clothing to the sick prisoners."

The statement said Siamak Pourzand, a freelance journalist who was jailed in 2000 for eight years, had even been tortured and was being held in a basement cell in Tehran's notorious Evin prison.-AFP