Online Special 2000 International Press Freedom Awards May 8, 2000: Three experts discuss the Iranian parliamentary elections. Feb. 21, 2000: Voters choose Reformists in first round July 13, 1999: Students rally in Iran's most violent protests in two decades. July 26, 1998: Online Forum: U.S.-Iranian relations Dec. 15, 1997: Iran's newly-elected president calls for better U.S. relations. May 26, 1997: Mohammad Khatami is elected president of Iran. Browse the NewsHour's coverage of the Middle East.     Islamic Republic News Agency Arabic News Committee to Protect Journalists	Iranian journalist Mashallah Shamsolvaezin was unable to attend the black-tie dinner given in his honor Nov. 21. While the other recipients of this year's International Press Freedom Awards enjoyed an evening at the Waldorf Astoria in New York City, Shamsolvaezin spent the evening as he has spent many others -- in Tehran's Evin Prison, where he is serving 2 ½ years for "insulting Islamic values." Shamsolvaezin was jailed in April after publishing an open letter and a column criticizing Iran's capital punishment practices. The stories were printed last year in Neshat, a daily newspaper headed by Shamsolvaezin and since shut down by the Iranian government. Before his arrest, Shamsolvaezin edited three other newspapers, only to watch the government ban each one in the span of two years. Although Neshat's characterization of Iranian "eye for an eye" punishment practices angered many government officials, some questioned the government's harsh reaction. "I am saddened by the fact that a prominent journalist is being sent to prison," Culture Minister Ataollah Mohajerani, who oversees the Iranian press, said in an interview with Reuters, "[but] I cannot do anything for him… The realization and institutionalization of freedom is a lengthy process." The government also charged Shamsolvaezin's publishing company, Jameeh-e-Ruz, with receiving support from the Iran Freedom Movement, a reformist Islamic group with a history of government opposition. The government also accused some of the company's leaders of possessing drugs and alcohol, substances banned in Iran. Before his incarceration, Shamsolvaezin asked Iranian president Mohammad Khatami for increased communication between the government and the press. "Either tell us that our press activities are illegal … or tell us clearly from which government body we are to get the minimum of political and professional security to continue our work," Shamsolvaezin wrote in his most recent reformist publication, Asr-e Azadegan. Khatami, seen as a moderate reformer, has been credited with relaxing Iran's traditionally strict social code. But reformist politicians have made little headway in opening up to the press since the country's supreme spiritual leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, ordered a halt to debate in the country's parliament over a motion to repeal press restrictions. Though Shamsolvaezin's former colleagues continue to push for reform of press restrictions in Iran, the fight is over, for the moment, for Shamsolvaezin. If his sentence remains unchanged, he'll be released from prison in 2002.