Newsweek's Iran correspondent Maziar Bahari has been sentenced in absentia to 74 lashes and 13-and-half-years in prison in Iran, according to a blog post written by the journalist on the magazine's website.

Bahari, who is currently living in London, said the sentence was handed down on Sunday. He has been charged with assembling and conspiring against state security, collecting secret and classified documents, spreading anti-government propaganda and insulting the Supreme Leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei and President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad.

Bahari, who is Iranian-Canadian, was one of the journalists arrested while reporting on the protests after Ahmadinejad's re-election in June last year. After imprisoning him for four months, the authorities released him on a bail.

The New York-based Committee to Protect Journalists has condemned the sentence.