During his imprisonment he was held in solitary confinement in a dark cell a metre in height, width and depth for two years.

[1] He was finally tried by an Islamic court in Sari on 3 December 1993 and sentenced to death on charges of apostasy.

[citation needed] On 18 January 1994, Bernard Levin reprinted Dibaj's courtroom speech in place of his usual column in The Times as a mark of respect.

[2] Following a worldwide outcry initiated by his friend and colleague Bishop Haik Hovsepian Mehr, Dibaj was finally freed in January 1994, although the death sentence was not lifted.

[4][5] The Times article and the murder of Hovsepian Mehr was alluded to in a debate in the House of Lords on Iran, and Viscount Brentford cited Levin's comment, 'how insubstantial must the grasp on a religion be, if it has to be propped up by hangings and woundings and beatings and murderings?