A B.C. father is making a tearful plea to help find his missing daughter, whom he believes is being detained in an Iranian prison.
Amir Bahraminia says his 35-year-old daughter, Behnoush, disappeared in Tehran along with her partner Mathew Safari, also known as Majid, nearly a year and a half ago.
“She is in trouble,” Bahraminia told Global News, “I know she is in Iran. I haven’t heard her voice and I haven’t seen her.”
The couple left B.C. for Tehran in November 2021. Behnoush’s parents say the pair planned to travel to the Persian Gulf Island of Kish. The family was in constant contact with Behnoush and had a close relationship, but since landing in Tehran on Nov. 6, 2021, the family in Canada has heard nothing from them.
Behnoush had previously travelled to Iran to visit family with no issues, her father said.
There’s no record of Behnoush’s arrest or any charges, but the family says two sources in Iran, who they can’t identify for safety reasons, allege the regime is holding her in prison, on “super threats to national security.”
Her family says Behnoush, a Canadian-Iranian who lived in Metro Vancouver, was not a political person. She was a manager at a spa in West Vancouver.
They say she enjoyed spending time with her family and had a degree in psychology from Iran. She wanted to start over again in her chosen field when she immigrated to Vancouver in 2013 but couldn’t due to language barriers. Instead, her family says, Behnoush trained as an aesthetician and was devoted to her job.
Safari, also Canadian-Iranian from Port Moody, had allegedly planned to buy an apartment on Kish Island. Behnoush’s parents say the home was being built by RoyalBox Group in Iran. Global News reached out to RoyalBox but the company has no record of any purchase.
Behnoush’s family also doesn’t know Safari’s whereabouts. His parents are deceased, they say, and it is not known if he has any family searching for him.
FULL STORY: https://globalnews.ca/news/9534977/canadian-woman-missing-iran-believed-detained/
