Week in Review

DoctorZin provides a review of this past week's [7/10-7/16] major news events regarding Iran.

Akbar Ganji's hunger strike: The world is beginning to take notice of Iranian dissident.

• Joe Katzman, WindsOfChange.net also took a look at the Ganji/Vaclav Havel comparison.
• Khaleej Times reported that Iran’s most prominent jailed dissident, journalist Akbar Ganji, has completed one month of hunger strike and is now demanding his unconditional release.
• Roozonline referring to the New York Sun in a lead editorial on Akbar Ganji being the Vaclav Havels of Iran, said several dissidents imprisoned by the Islamic Republic report that during interrogations they were repeatedly told that Iran refuses to allow any Vaclav Havels to speak out.
• DoctorZin's Special Report on Ganji, Tuesday, following President Bush's statement in support of Ganji's release.
• New York Sun in a editorial reminded us that dissidents in the Soviet Union played a key role in the fall of the that regime and argued Iranian dissidents may play a similar role in the fall of the Iranian regime.
• Eli Lake, The NY Sun reported that as Tehran University students clashed with police in Iran yesterday during demonstrations demanding the release of political prisoners, President Bush joined the growing movement calling for the release of dissident journalist Akbar Ganji.
• Khaleej Times reported that Iranian political activists on Wednesday asked the United Nations to intervene for the release of Iranian journalist, Ganji.
• Gooya News published an urgent call to action in support of Akbar Ganji. A good brief on Ganji.
• Iran Press Service reported that an Iranian MP was “advising” Mr. Ganji to continue his hunger strike until he dies.
• Yahoo News reported that Iran's government said Wednesday that President Bush shouldn't intervene in the case of a jailed Iranian dissident, particularly given allegations of U.S. human rights violations.
• BBC News reported that five Iranian MPs say they want to meet the jailed dissident Akbar Ganji, soon.
• Human Rights Watch claimed Ganji's life is in danger.
• Akbar Ganji, FreeGanji.blogspot.com: in his own words. Ganji's Second Letter to the Free People of the World.
• The Voice of America outlined the views of the United States government on Akbar Ganji.
• Yahoo News reported that the pressure on as jailed Iranian dissident hints death is near.
• Gulf Daily News reported that Iran's judiciary said yesterday hunger-striking jailed journalist Akbar Ganji would not be released.
• Yahoo News reported that the State Department said it was disturbed by reports that peaceful protesters who demonstrated in support of a jailed Iranian dissident were treated brutally by Iranian police.
• Roozonline reported that at Tuesday's demonstration in support of Ganji the military was under strict orders to engage protestors and would see to it that such demonstrations were put to an end.
• Iranian blogger, Ali Mohammad Abtahi, Webneveshteha reported Khatami as saying, I ask Ganji to write a letter asking for freedom and I ask Ayatollah Shahroodi to set him free.
• Christian Science Monitor reported that Iranian journalists say they have been instructed by judiciary officials in recent days not to write about the Ganji case. Plus an excerpt of one of Ganji's letters from prison.
• Eli Lake, The NY Sun reported that as three senators joined President Bush's call for the Iranian regime to release dissident journalist Akbar Ganji from prison, the secretary-general of the United Nations, Kofi Annan, yesterday refused to comment as did Senator Lugar.
• Khaleej Times reported that Ganji he fainted and was transferred to the prison clinic where a serum was administered intravenously.

The London Bombing.

• The Sunday Times UK reported that the Mastermind of Madrid is key figure. Do the London Bombings Lead Back to Iran? Dan Darling reminded me of Nasar's connection to Iran.
• Colin Freeman, The Telegraph UK reported that the editor of the world's leading Arab newspaper has launched a scathing attack on Muslims in Britain.
• Rudolph W. Giuliani, USA Today discussed what's next in the war on terror.

More on the Election Fraud.

• Iran Focus reported that Mehdi Karroubi said fake ballots were used in two provinces to bolster the vote for Mahmoud Ahmadinejad.
• Payvand reported that Mehdi Karroubi urged President Mohammad Khatami to publish the report on the violations that had taken place during the recent presidential elections.

Iran's Troublemaking Outside of Iran.

• Iran Focus reported that Iran has been blamed for three attempts to assassinate a key Kurdish dissident leader.
• The Associated Press reported that as Hamas moves to the mainstream, Islamic Jihad (funded by Iran) seeks to upstage it with violence.
• International Relations and Security Network reported that Argentina now admits failure in the bomb probe that implicated Iran in a 1994 attack on a Jewish center there.

Iran's nuclear negotiations.

• IranMania reported that a top official in Iran said it has managed to ease concerns that it is seeking nuclear weapons and therefore should soon resume sensitive enrichment activity.
• Reuters reported that Iran insisted its nuclear policy would not change.
• Press Trust of India reported that Iran will have new ideas on its contentious nuclear program the country's ultraconservative president-elect has said.
• Eurasia Daily Monitor reported that an Iranian nuclear team arrived in Moscow seeking new partnerships.
• Iran Focus published an interview with a defector from Iran’s secretive nuclear establishment, who says that Iran is close to a nuclear bomb.
• Daily Times top negotiator Hassan Rowhani was quoted as saying, with the end of the mandate of the current government; my tenure will come to an end just as is the case for other ministers.
• Yahoo News reported the White House as saying, there needs to be a permanent end to Iran's uranium enrichment and reprocessing activities. We have made that very clear."
• WorldNetDaily reported that the Iranian Mullah's goal is nuclear terror in the U.S.
• Khaleej Times reported that once again, Iran said, no incentive would make Iran drop its nuclear fuel program.
• World Tribune discussed the South African link to Iran's nuclear program.
• SwissPolitics reported that the EU3 foreign ministers will agree to press on with a diplomatic initiative to try to persuade Iran to abandon its nuclear ambitions despite gloom since the election of an Islamic hard-liner as president.
  

The Iranian Economy.

• Red Nova News reported that the Ukraine is increasing energy machinery deliveries to Iran.
• India Express reported that India spurred by Pakistan’s eagerness on the Iran-Pakistan-India pipeline, has stepped on the gas pedal.
• IranMania reported that the British government issued $182 m in financial support for UK companies doing business with Iran.

Human Rights/Freedom of the press inside of Iran.

• Iranian.ws reported that Iran will soon have women only parks built in all the cities of Tehran Province.
• Iranian blogger, Nazanin Namdar, Roozonline reported the deputy police chief said “one cannot deny torture in detention centers.” He is quick to add that “… it is an illegal act.”
• Dozame.org reported that Iranian prisoner Cehangir Baduzade was punished with 25 whiplashes because of his hunger strike.

Popular struggle for freedom inside of Iran.

• Iranian blogger,Windsteed, Iran Hopes 2005 was a witness to the July 1999 crackdown of the student in Iran. With the collapse of most demonstrations yesterday in Iran, he concluded, Let the regime be happy for the moment that it has silenced the people. But it is only silence before the storm.
• Roozonline reminded us on the sixth anniversary of the July 9th Student Uprising no one is yet to be charged with the murder of Ezzat Ebrahimnejad.
• Iran Focus reported that a government official from the town of Chabahar (southeast Iran) was gunned down by unknown assailants.
• Reuters reported that a little-known Sunni Muslim group has beheaded an Iranian security agent abducted last month in officially Shiite Iran and has issued a video tape of the killing.
• Iran Focus reported that Iran's State Security Forces on Sunday opened fire at youths in the north-western volatile Kurdish town of Mahabad, leaving one young man dead, dragging his body through the town. Graphic photos.
• Kurdmedia reported that thousands of Kurds protested the murder of the Kurdish youth by Iranian Pasdarans in the city of Mahabad.
• Tehran Times reported that Iran’s new national police chief said, Our society is a young one... we must deal with them patiently.
• Iran Focus reported that at least 200 agents of Iran’s State Security Forces on Monday conducted a midnight raid in the central park in Tabriz, arresting anyone in sight.
• Iran Focus reported that at least 100 demonstrators were arrested and 60 buses damaged in clashes that erupted Saturday in Iran's second largest city.
• Iran Focus reported that unrest continued in Mahabad. Close to 1,000 people gathered in the main path leading to Independence Square and started to march forward. They were joined quickly by several thousand of the local population shouting anti regime slogans. The regime retaliated brutally.

Popular support outside of Iran for the pro-democracy efforts in Iran.

• Fourth World War reported that a junior member of the State Department's Policy Planning staff is blocking the expenditure of $3 million to promote pro-Western democratic forces in Iran.

Iran and the International community.

• The Washington Post reported that Iraq's defense minister said Monday that a military agreement reached with Iran last week does not include any provision for the Iranian armed forces to help train Iraqi troops.
• IranMania reported that Iraqi Shiite Prime Minister Ibrahim Jaafari is to travel to Iran on Saturday.
• The Washington Times reported that the Iraqi government is increasingly turning to Iran for investment, refined oil products, electricity and other needs.
• BBC News reported that Iran said more than 1,000 members of al-Qaeda have been apprehended in the country and that some 200 suspects remained in custody. A pre-emptive attempt to calm Iraqi concerns over al Qaeda role in the Iraqi insurgency.
  
• Axis Information and Analysis reported a Russian official as saying, Iran in fact is an island of a relative stability in the center of perhaps the most unstable region in the world.

Must Read reports.

• The Weekly Standard published a major report on the Al Qaeda/Iraq connection.
• Jeffrey Gedmin, The Weekly Standard argued that if the United States is serious about preventing the mullahs from getting the bomb, we have two choices: either preemption or regime change.
• The Financial Times reported that Curt Weldon, a senior Republican politician will ask the Central Intelligence Agency to investigate whether a former agent endangered US national security by allegedly leaking the identity of an Iranian dissident to journalists.
• Council on Foreign Relations reported Henry A. Kissinger as saying, says that if Iran secures nuclear weapons, nonproliferation may cease to be a meaningful policy.
• The Washington Times reported that Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's presence is already felt in the political circles and the streets of Tehran. Since his election, under the banner of a renewed Islamic revolution, the clerical regime hanged six people and sentenced another to death in the past week alone.
• Ramin Parham, Iran Shahr Blog compares key elements in the fall of the Soviet Union and sees parallels with the Iranian regime.
• Iran Focus reported that a recent survey found that the majority of Arabs believe that Mahmoud Ahmadinejad will have a negative impact on stability in the Middle East.

The Experts.

• Michael Ledeen, National Review said he, ... does not know if the Iranians were involved in the London bombings, but it really does not matter, for Iran is the most potent force in the terror network.
• Victor Davis Hanson, National Post outlined how to lose the war on terror.
• Michael Ledeen, National Review explains Blair's strange omission of Israel and Iraq from his list to nations facing terrorism.
  
• Michael Ledeen, National Review reported on the silence of so many to the plight of Iranian dissident's such as Akbar Ganji, as well as the growing unrest in Iran and the recent evidence of Iran’s support for bin Laden and al Qaeda. Dan Darling has a follow up post.
  

Photos and cartoons of the week.

• Iranian.com published photos of Ganji on his 33rd day of his hunger strike.
• The latest photo of Ganji in prison.
• Ganji: a cartoon.
• The body of Shavaneh Qaderi. They are disturbing and very graphic. Beware. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8
  

And finally, The Quote of the Week. An old quote but relevant.

Ella Wheeler Wilcox: To sin by silence...

To sin by silence, when we should protest,
Makes cowards out of men. The human race
Has climbed on protest. Had no voice been raised
Against injustice, ignorance, and lust,
The inquisition yet would serve the law,
And guillotines decide our least disputes.
The few who dare, must speak and speak again
To right the wrongs of many. Speech, thank God,
No vested power in this great day and land
Can gag or throttle. ...

Saturday's Daily Briefing on Iran

DoctorZin reports, 7.16.2005:

The Strange Death of Iranian Islamism

Ramin Parham, Iran Shahr Blog:

Political Islam, at least in its contemporary form and content, was born in Iran, under the auspices of Khomeini, Ali Shariati, and a 1960s-intelligentsia (1). "To make communist rule secure in the USSR for the indefinite future", Soviet leadership under Gorbachev made "a strategic decision". However, operating in a world of increasing openness, glasnost and perestroika, from within a system designed to be closed, "set the ball rolling toward the system's collapse" (2). Pursuing the same objective of lasting rule and learning maybe from their defunct Soviet predecessors, the revolutionary junta controlling Iran since 1979 made, on June 24, their own strategic decision: rolling back on the system's backbone. ...

In a postmortem analysis of the factors involved in the Strange Death of Soviet Communism, Charles H. Fairbanks Jr. sums up the most important ones as: a) long-term social and intellectual modernization; b) economic stagnation; c) the accident of Gorbachev's leadership; d) the regime's political culture and tradition; e) western and public pressures (4).

Are these factors at play in the inescapable death of political Islam in Iran? READ MORE

An important analysis as to why the regime's days are numbered.

Here are a few other news items you may have missed.

• Iran Focus reported that at least 100 demonstrators were arrested and 60 buses damaged in clashes that erupted Saturday in Iran's second largest city.
• Khaleej Times reported that Ganji he fainted and was transferred to the prison clinic where a serum was administered intravenously.
• The Washington Times reported that the Iraqi government is increasingly turning to Iran for investment, refined oil products, electricity and other needs.
• Iran Focus reported that unrest continued in Mahabad. Close to 1,000 people gathered in the main path leading to Independence Square and started to march forward. They were joined quickly by several thousand of the local population shouting anti regime slogans. The regime retaliated brutally.
• Khaleej Times reported that once again, Iran said, no incentive would make Iran drop its nuclear fuel program.
• BBC News reported that Iran said more than 1,000 members of al-Qaeda have been apprehended in the country and that some 200 suspects remained in custody. Plus my response.
• India Express reported that India spurred by Pakistan’s eagerness on the Iran-Pakistan-India pipeline, has stepped on the gas pedal.
• SwissPolitics reported that the EU3 foreign ministers will agree to press on with a diplomatic initiative to try to persuade Iran to abandon its nuclear ambitions despite gloom since the election of an Islamic hard-liner as president.
• IranMania reported that the British government issued $182 m in financial support for UK companies doing business with Iran.
• Dozame.org reported that Iranian prisoner Cehangir Baduzade was punished with 25 whiplashes because of his hunger strike.
• World Tribune discussed the South African link to Iran's nuclear program.
• And finally, Iran Focus reported that a recent survey found that the majority of Arabs believe that Mahmoud Ahmadinejad will have a negative impact on stability in the Middle East.

The Strange Death of Iranian Islamism

Ramin Parham, Iran Shahr Blog:

Political Islam, at least in its contemporary form and content, was born in Iran, under the auspices of Khomeini, Ali Shariati, and a 1960s-intelligentsia (1). "To make communist rule secure in the USSR for the indefinite future", Soviet leadership under Gorbachev made "a strategic decision". However, operating in a world of increasing openness, glasnost and perestroika, from within a system designed to be closed, "set the ball rolling toward the system's collapse" (2). Pursuing the same objective of lasting rule and learning maybe from their defunct Soviet predecessors, the revolutionary junta controlling Iran since 1979 made, on June 24, their own strategic decision: rolling back on the system's backbone.

As the Lebanese Hezbollah is consolidating its political and military positions in anticipation for stormy times ahead, their Iranian masters in Tehran, who have continually maintained Hezbollah's arms procurement chain active through Damascus airport (3), decided, through a fabricated plebiscite, to consolidate their positions in preparation of an inevitable zero-sum showdown with anything that is not them: their own people and the world. Streamlining power was a necessary strategic decision.

In a postmortem analysis of the factors involved in the Strange Death of Soviet Communism, Charles H. Fairbanks Jr. sums up the most important ones as: a) long-term social and intellectual modernization; b) economic stagnation; c) the accident of Gorbachev's leadership; d) the regime's political culture and tradition; e) western and public pressures (4).

Are these factors at play in the inescapable death of political Islam in Iran? READ MORE

a) Long-term social and intellectual modernization

On September 23, 1978, in an interview with my father, Baqer Parham, Michel Foucault lashes out at the western model of society, as the "harshest, most savage, most selfish, most dishonest, oppressive society one could possibly imagine", greeting Khomeini's revolution as an "alternative based on Islamic teachings" (5). Foucault is an emblematic figure. In Iran's aging numerus clausus circle of intellectuals, Mahmood Dowlat-Abadi is another emblematic figure. Describing himself as a "socialist ... who, from month to month, never steps out of his house" (1), Dowlat-Abadi has, turn in turn, supported Khomeini in 1979, Khatami in 1997, and Rafsanjani in 2005. Justifying his and other Iranian intellectuals' recent support for Rafsanjani, Dowlat-Abadi speaks of his brethren and himself as those "who have abandoned unreachable ideals and settled instead on a minimal average", hoping "for the emergence of an opposition within the opposition within the framework of the political-ideological system of the Islamic Republic". Foucault is dead and Dowlat-Abadi is, just as his "minimal average" Rafsanjani, a man of the past, a very old past indeed.

Today, what provides the gravitational force of Iran's long-term social and intellectual modernization is a demographically young country that ranks number one worldwide for its 15-29 years-old population, which, culturally, recognizes itself, with an overwhelming 80% majority, in "its Iranian identity" (6). Representative of the socially and intellectually modernized constellation of Iranian political thought are the views, expressed by such varying figures as Mohsen Sazgara, Akbar Ganji, Mehrangiz Kar, and Reza Pahlavi. Far from this gravitational center, Rafsanjani's political Islam and Dowlat-Abadi's socialism are dust circling in platitude on a vain orbit.

Forged in destinies light-years apart from each other, Sazgara, a close Khomeini collaborator and co-founder of the Islamic Revolutionary Guards, now living in exile in the US; Ganji, another founding figure of the islamic regime who also took part in the hostage taking disaster at the US Embassy in Tehran, now turned a voiceful dissident and dying of a hunger strike in Iran's Evin prison; Kar, one of Iran's most outspoken Human Rights activists and prolific woman writers, arrested on April 29, 2000, now in exile in the US; and Pahlavi, heir to the throne of Cyrus the Great, who, in forty four years, has experienced the highest of all heights and walked the dark valleys of exile as the son of a persecuted Shah; they all speak the same language, not that of a "minimal average" but one of the high moral grounds of the common good, of a resolutely modern Iran that must be built upon Human Rights and the principle of the sovereignty of the people.

b) Economic stagnation

Much has been said about this stagnation. Neither the collectivization and islamization of the economy under the islamic socialist brand of Mir Hossein Musavi, in what Sazgara calls the [first] republic of revolution and war; nor the import-substitution economy of Rafsanjani, with its plethora of nepotism and plutocracy of the bazaar and the merchant-clerics; nor Khatami's 150 billion dollar oil revenue, the fourth oil income in OPEC over the past 8 years; nor the projected militarization of the existing islamic economy under a Ahmadinejad government; none of the above would bring the slightest remedy to Iran's ailing economy. What political Islam has brought to Iran is an absolute poverty that engulfs at least40% of the total population (7); a per capita income that has fallen from a pre-revolutionary $4,000 to less than $1,500 (8); in excess of $10 billion of smuggled goods each year; 3 million drug addicts; and a job market that inflates by an influx of 800,000 job seekers every year. August Comte analyzed the French Revolution as "destructive" resulting into a [French] society that was "essentially economic without founding [religious] believes". "No society, he said, could live without his members having a shared system of values" (9). The destructive Islamic Revolution in Iran, far from having filled the gap that separates the State from the People, far from having strenghtened religious faith, has had similar effects on the Iranian society: an anomie, in terms of moral and religious values, coupled with managerial chaos and economic pauperization.

c) The accident of Khatami's leadership

This point too has been the subject of much writing. Far from being the adulated "teacher of moral, knowledge, and patience" painted by his followers (10), Khatami was neither a Gorbachev, nor a Khrushchev, nor even a Yuri Andropov who, in his campaign against the era of stagnation, and as the head of the KGB, "used his organization to blackmail and weaken the Brezhnevite faction ... and secure the most powerful position for his chosen heir, Michail Gorbachev". Khatami's designated heir, in the latest round of presidential elections in Iran, was Mostafa Moiin. The fabricated plebiscite of June 24 was a slap in the face of Khatami's heir and political faction. Both Moiin and Khatami are the acceptable faces of a political family, the melli-mazhabi or religious-nationalists with a dissident figure embodied by Ebrahim Yazdi, tolerated by the revolutionary junta. The recent electoral episode proved it once again: the more they are "slapped in the face", a central expression in Khomeinist political culture, the more subservient they become. If decision, to paraphrase a western playwright, is the art of being cruel at the right time, Khatami proved to be neither an artist nor a decision maker. His leadership was as hollow as it is supposed to be according to the islamic Constitution. Some saw in Khatami an accident of the theocracy; others, saw in him the omen of an age of postmodern politics burgeoning in the spring of Tehran; others yet, saw in his presidency an expedient designed as a tactical move to evade violent and imminent collapse. If accident there were in Khatami's experience it ought to be sought in the fact that Khatami's governments, think tanks, scholars, editorials and intellectuals, ... demonstrated, better than any outside enemy of the Islamic Republic could have dreamed of, the essential inadaptability of the regime to demands of modernity. Now, as Sazgara argues in his latest article, there is one line and two camps: the people against the Supreme Leader, as the constitutional and effectual embodiment of power in Iran. No more cubism!

d) The regime's political culture and tradition

It is impossible to understand anything about the strange death of the soviet regime without seriously considering its Utopian origins. It was the Utopian origin that led the communist regime to "its extraordinary pretensions, pageantry and bombast" says Fairbanks. "The revolutionary spirit, says the American sovietologist, may have been at work continually throughout Soviet history ... [a system that] can be compared to something run by an internal combustion engine, with its controlled explosions. These explosions set up enormous stresses." There is a relation, Fairbanks says, between the original Bolshevik revolutionary project and the instability of Soviet politics (4). At the end, the stresses killed the Soviet regime.

The islamic political regime in Iran is also the translation of a founding revolutionary idea, the emanation of a "Utopian origin". From the pretension of a classless towhidi society, where, quite understandably, the economy would be the basis for donkeys who aspire to nothing but melons; to the pageantry of Mir Hossein Musavi and Rafsanjani's Chinese and born-dead Malaysian models; to the hollowness of religious democracy and bombast of Khatami; to a Karrubi's electoral promise of $50 monthly payments to every Iranian aged 16 and above; to the now debated handouts of cash subsidies to all the neediest in the poverty-stricken islamic utopia, the history of political Islam ruling Iran is littered with pretensions, pageantry and bombast. Feeling the heat, the regime's June 24 Eintopfgericht, as Ganji argues in reference to Hitler's streamlining of Nazi power, with Ahmadinejad as the embodiment of the "Utopian origins", is the continuation of the original project of the de-westernization of Iran, its de-modernization, its palestinization, and its pauperization to the extent where every single Iranian would be in need for $50 monthly handouts from the islamic State. Could the regime's Eintopfgericht prove to be its last "controlled explosion" which could well set up a social and political implosion? The answer is probably yes, pending other factors.

e) Western and public pressures

Since June 24, facing the inescapable realities of the essentials of the islamic regime, the West is showing renewed signs of a political will needed to put effective pressure upon the regime. President Bush reiterated his belief on the undemocratic nature of the regime, on the eve of the first round of elections in Iran. Prime Minister Tony Blair, reinvigorated by a second British mandate, a strong economy, and a near European-wide acceptance of the soundness of his model, and now assuming the Presidency of the EU for the next six months, seems to be in no mood for further fruitless talks with the mullahs. Germany's Schroeder, facing a looming defeat in September, is in no position to pursue "critical" or "constructive" dialogues with the theocracy. The French are dubious. But, weakened in Europe, desperately sunk in a gray economy, and, with the blatant defeat of Khatami and his intellectuals and think tanks, France, as a recent analyst pointed out in Le Figaro on the aftermath of Ahmadinejad's victory, has less and less leverage to weigh in on Iranian affairs. One could hope that the French civil society, or at least a minority part of it, would stand up where French politics fail. Bernard-Henry Levi's latest article in Le Point, as well as courageous positions upheld by Andre Glucksmann, Pierre Lelouche, Alain Madelein, Jean-Francois Revel, Pascal Bruckner, or Alain Fincklekraut, all highlight this hope in some enlightened corners of the French civil society, as opposed to the worn-out insipidity of its politics. Western pressure, as Pahlavi and Sazgara and many others have repeatedly said, must be put on the regime's terrorist record, regional connections, and the murder cases that were once hastily buried by western tribunals reactivated. Human Rights should be back on the table as the central piece of any talks with Iranian diplomatic envoys.

Public pressure in Iran exists in sporadic forms. It must be given content and organization. In doing so, one essential element should be the focus of all political actors united behind the tactics of civil disobedience and a free referendum: the demographic composition of today's Iran and its political dynamics. Iran, as we said earlier in this column, is overwhelmingly young. Its political dynamics are overwhelmingly female. Political Islam has brought nothing to Iranian young men and women except jagged souls and bodies, millions of amputated lives, millions of addicted lungs, millions of scarfed and veiled heads and faces that see no joy and no hope, day after day, year after year (11). The Utopian project of political Islam wrecked havoc upon Iran in grand part thanks to the intellectual secretions of a certain elite, best exemplified, but not restricted to, by Mahmood Dowlat-Abadi. No real change will come to Iran, no effective public pressure would take form and content, until the alternative political voice in Iran is given its demographically and dynamically relevant new face: a rejuvenated Iran where Zan, woman, is the source of Zendegi, Life.

Notes and References:

(1) Mahmood Dowlat-Abadi in an interview with Shargh daily, Tehran, July 14, 2005

(2) The Role of Popular Discontent, in The Strange Death of Soviet Communism. The National Interest, Special Issue, spring 1993.

(3) Les conservateurs iraniens renforcent leur emprise sur le Hezbollah. By Georges Malbrunot, in Le Figaro, Paris July 13, 2005.

(4) The Nature of the Beast. By Charles H. Fairbanks Jr. in The Strange Death of Soviet Communism. The National Interest, Special Issue, spring 1993.

(5) Dialogue Between Michel Foucault and Baqer Parham: on Marx, Islam, Christianity, and Revolution. in Doedalus, winter 2005.

Download Foucault_Parham_Interview_23Sept1978.pdf

(6) Head of Iran's Youth Organization in an interview with ISNA, Tehran, August 18, 2004.

(7) Head of the Economics Department of Tarbiat Moallem University, in an interview with FARS News Agency, Tehran, June 20, 2005.

(8) The Ninth Presidential Elections and Us, by Mohammad-Mohsen Sazgara, in www.60000000.com

(9) Tocqueville et Marx, in Dix-huit lecons sur la societe industrielle. By Raymond Aron, Paris 1962.

(10) cf. ISNA's dedicated pages to Khatami at http://www.isna.ir/main/ServiceView.aspx?SrvID=Khatami

11) Others may argue that, thanks to political Islam and "islamic universities", millions have been educated, especially among the female population. The bombasters however forget to mention the cost of such accomplishments for there would have been a far more cost-effective way to achieve the same result under different circumstances. In Europe, World War I and II precipitated many social reforms, such as women's right to vote, but it would be absurd to argue that European systems needed, as if by necessity, over 50 million dead and many more injured, in order to achieve those reforms.

An important analysis as to why the regime's days are numbered.

100 Arrested, 60 Buses Damaged in Iran City Protests

Iran Focus:

At least 100 demonstrators were arrested and 60 buses damaged in clashes that erupted Saturday after a football match in Iran’s second largest city. Security forces and young people clashed over a large area of the city of Mashad after a football match between Saba Battery and Abu-Moslem football clubs.

Clashes began as supporters of the Mashad-based Abu-Moslem booed the referee for what they said was an unfair penalty. As security forces moved in to put down the protest, protesters began throwing stones and using flagpoles to push back the truncheon-wielding policemen.

Skirmishes spilt out of the stadium and into the surrounding districts, as the protest took on a political hue with young people chanting, “guns, tanks and [the paramilitary] Bassijis are no longer effective”. READ MORE

The clashes in Mashad mark the third large-scale confrontation between security forces and young people in Iranian cities in less than a week since the inauguration of a hard-line Revolutionary Guards commander as the chief of the police. Brigadier General Ismail Ahmadi Moghaddam vowed upon assuming responsibility for Iran’s law enforcement forces that he would crack down on all “enemies of the Islamic Republic”.

Football matches often provide an arena for Iran’s frustrated youth to vent their anger at the Islamic regime. At least seven people were killed in Tehran’s Azadi Stadium when clashes erupted after a World Cup qualifier between Iran and Japan. An inquiry into the deaths blamed the security forces.

Jailed Iran Dissident to Continue Hunger Srike

Agence France Press, Khaleej Times:

Jailed dissident Iranian write Akbar Ganji, who has been on a hunger strike for more than a month, intends to carry on until he is unconditionally freed from prison, his wife told Iran's student-run news agency Isna yesterday. "Ganji will keep up this hunger strike indefinitely. He is determined to be unconditionally freed," Massoumeh Shafiie said after visiting him on Thursday in prison.

She said Ganji was taken to the prison hospital Monday and doctors said he "needed one month of complete rest outside of prison" because of his back problems.

On Tuesday, prison doctors advised Ganji to take a "serum containing sugar and salt but he refused." When he returned to his cell, "he fainted and was transferred to the prison clinic where the serum was administered intravenously." "Since Ganji weighs no more than 54kg and his blood pressure has taken a dive, prison doctors decided to keep him in the clinic under round-the-clock surveillance," Shafiie said.

Iraq Taps Iran for Security, Commerce

Sharon Behn, The Washington Times:

The Iraqi government, frustrated with the slow pace of reconstruction, is increasingly turning to Iran for investment, refined oil products, electricity and other needs. READ MORE

Prime Minister Ibrahim al-Jaafari is to lead a top-level delegation to Iran today to boost security and economic relations between the two Shi'ite-majority nations.

Six ministers, including Iraqi Foreign Minister Hoshyar Zebari, are to accompany Mr. al-Jaafari on his four-day visit to Tehran, said the prime minister's spokesman, Laith Kubba.

"Iraq would like to build trust with Iran against the background of hostility and mistrust that cuts deep," said Mr. Kubba, from Baghdad.

Although he welcomes increased economic and security cooperation, the spokesman said, Mr. al-Jaafari also would make it clear to Tehran that Baghdad would not allow any political interference.

"The prime minister is going to deliver this message very clearly. It is tempting for Iran to meddle with Iraq's affairs; it might be tempting for the Iranians to overstep the line. The prime minister wants to make sure this will not be the case," Mr. Kubba said.

U.S. Ambassador to Iraq Zalmay Khalilzad said Wednesday that Washington wanted "to see these two countries have good relations with each other" but without "interference in Iraqi affairs."

Many members of Iraq's new government spent years in exile in Iran during Saddam Hussein's dictatorship and maintain strong links with their hard-line Islamic neighbor -- a cause of concern for Iraq's secularists, Sunnis and Christian religious minorities, and the United States.

"I can well imagine that they have to be very, very careful with these steps," said Phebe Marr, a senior fellow and Iraq expert at the United States Institute of Peace.

Improving ties with Iran, "while it might solve some problems, could open some wounds," she cautioned.

Iraq hopes to coordinate efforts to stop widespread smuggling, organized crime and drug routes across its long and porous border with Iran, while increasing desperately needed imports of refined oil, electricity, water and transportation links.

America's hugely expensive reconstruction efforts of the past two years have failed to deliver significant improvements in those essential services, mainly because of the raging insurgency in Iraq.

"You would have a riot in Basra now if it were not for all the oil products, like [gasoline] and cooking gas and kerosene coming from Iran," said Entifad Qanbar, spokesman for Ahmed Chalabi's Iraqi National Congress, part of the ruling political alliance.

Basra sits near the southeastern border with Iran. Cheap goods flow into the south from Iran, while Turkish products come in through Iraq's northern border.

Mr. al-Jaafari's trip follows on Iraqi Defense Minister Sadoun al-Dulaimi's recent successful visit to Iran, when the two governments signed a billion memorandum of understanding, said President Jalal Talabani's chief of staff, Kamaran Karadaghi.

Details of the agreement are still being worked out, he said, but a portion of the money is dedicated to Iraq's defense needs, which would beef up military cooperation between the neighbors.

One member of the leading Supreme Council for Islamic Revolution in Iraq party said it was unlikely that Iran would provide any military training.

"The Iranians are the winners in the Iraqi game; they got rid of Saddam Hussein, [and] most of their friends are in power," he said, speaking on the condition of anonymity.

But, he added, "I believe we are still in need of coalition troops."

Iraq and Iran fought a war from 1980 through 1988.

Mr. Qanbar said Iraq wanted good relations with all its neighbors, including Iran. "There is no intention whatsoever that improving relations with Iran will influence in any way relations with the United States," he said.

Nevertheless, it is likely the United States is closely watching the Iraqi government's relationship with Iran, listed by President Bush as part of the "axis of evil" along with prewar Iraq and North Korea.

"I'll bet you there are some Americans concerned about this, and I hope they are keeping an eye on it," Ms. Marr said.

Paul Hughes, a retired U.S. colonel who served in Iraq and is now with the United States Institute of Peace, said pragmatism would inevitably trump Iraqi concerns over ideology.

"You got to dance with the devil over there," he said.

Iran: Clashes erupt in Mahabad, SSF vehicle set on fire

Iran Focus:

Unrest continued in the north-western town of Mahabad, Iranian Kurdistan province, last night, with clashes erupting between locals and State Security Forces, following a week of similar anti-government protests which flared up after news broke out of the brutal murder of a young Kurdish man by the SSF.

Yesterday evening, close to 1,000 people gathered in the main path leading to Independence Square and started to march forward. They were joined quickly by several thousand of the local population and together they started chanting anti-government slogans and burning tyres. As they crowded Independence square, chants of “Death to Khamenei” could be heard, referring to the clerical state’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei.

Chants of “Shoan, we will continue your struggle” echoed in the square. READ MORE

On Sunday, agents of the SSF opened fire on Shoan Qaderi and two of his friends in an avenue near Independence Square. The security forces then proceeded with tying Qaderi’s body to a Toyota jeep and while driving dragged him in streets, according to eye-witnesses.

Witnesses said that the act was carried out because Qaderi was active in anti-government protests and authorities wanted to intimidate the local population to prevent further demonstrations in the volatile city.

Minutes after Qaderi’s body was dragged throughout the town, several hundred angry residents gathered in nearby streets and started to chant anti-government slogans.

Last night’s demonstration was met with swift and fierce retribution by anti-riot forces already stationed there to prevent a re-emergence of dissent. The SSF fired live rounds and tear gas to disperse the crowd. Several protestors including a child were gravely wounded and were driven to a local hospital by fellow demonstrators. A number of SSF agents were also injured. At least a dozen people were detained and taken to unknown locations.

Gasoline was poured onto the ground and set alight at several locations surrounding the square to stop the sting of the tear gas.

As the violence escalated, protestors set an SSF vehicle and several nearby government buildings on fire. Clashes ensued until well after midnight.

Several hundred people have been arrested over the past week during numerous hit-and-run clashes and house-to-house raids.

Several other large anti-government demonstrations have rocked the town of Mahabad in recent month.

In an earlier report I included the graphic photos of remains of Shoan Qaderi.

No incentive will make Iran drop nuclear fuel programme

Khaleej Times:

No incentive would make Iran drop its nuclear fuel programme, the spokesman for Iran’s Supreme National Security Council (SNSC) said on Saturday. READ MORE

“Even if the West provided us with all economic, political and security incentives, Iran would not drop its nuclear fuel programme,” Ali Aqamohammadi told ISNA news agency.

The spokesman was referring to a proposal by the European Union trio of Britain, France and Germany, which reportedly offered Teheran cooperation in providing nuclear power besides a package of economic and political incentives.

“Maintaining nuclear fuel technology is our red line which will also determine whether to continue the talks or not,” the spokesman warned.

He said Iran’s right to produce its own nuclear fuel was the main basis in the talks with the EU trio since October 2003, adding that Teheran would never ever make any concessions in this regard.

Iran wants to resume uranium enrichment in the power plants of Isfahan and Natanz in central Iran for producing its own nuclear fuel.

The EU and the United States staunchly oppose this, as enriched uranium could also be used for producing atomic bombs.

Teheran has warned that anything except acknowledgement of Iran’s legitimate right to pursue nuclear technology would be unacceptable and lead to severance of negotiations.

Another cause for concern inside and outside Iran was seen as the probable change in the nuclear delegation, with its chief Hassan Rowhani being replaced following the end of President Mohammad Khatami’s presidential term next month.

Although president-elect Mahmoud Ahmadinejad initially vowed to keep the negotiation team appointed by his predecessor, he announced last Tuesday that he would adopt a new foreign policy, including the nuclear field.

Iran announces al-Qaeda arrests

BBC News:

Iran has said more than 1,000 members of al-Qaeda have been apprehended in the country since the Taleban regime collapsed in Afghanistan in 2001.

Intelligence Minister Ali Younessi says most had been jailed or deported. Some 200 suspects remained in custody. READ MORE

Iran has always denied US allegations of harbouring senior al-Qaeda members, but it has also been reluctant to give details of arrests in the past.

This is the highest number of suspects Iran has said have been on its soil.

The announcement came before talks with an Iraqi delegation expected to cover security along the Iran-Iraq border.

Mr Younessi said the suspects had come into Iran in five waves, the most recent being last week.

He also said the Iranian authorities had found al-Qaeda terrorist cells in the east of the country in recent days with the help of Sunni clergymen.

Last month, a senior cleric said Iran had arrested and deported nearly 500 al-Qaeda members who had been hiding in the country over the last three years.

Al-Qaeda influx

Mr Younessi, quoted by the AFP news agency, said Iran was first subjected to an influx of "several thousand Afghans and other nationals" who came into the country illegally after the fall of the Taleban regime, and who were later sent back out.

Then, some al-Qaeda operatives who had taken refuge in Iranian cities were arrested "because they intended to use Iranian territory to launch terrorist strikes on other countries," he said.

"The third wave of al-Qaeda was operating mainly under the cover of Ansar al-Islam, which is based in Iraq. We arrested and tried a number of this group's militants, who are still in prison," he said.

Al-Qaeda members were then linked to a criminal and drug-trafficking gang planning attacks in Tehran and other large cities, he said.

"These elements were also arrested and imprisoned," he said, adding that their chief was still at large.

"Some of the cells we identified act autonomously without being linked to a central command because today al-Qaeda is disorganised," he said.

This is an obvious attempt of the Iranian regime to confuse the world community about the status of al Qaeda in Iran.

There have been many reports of an Iran/al Qaeda connection. Intelligence reports have suggested that the majority of al Qaeda leaders are in the area around Chalous under the watch of the Qods force, which the new President of Iran was a its founder.

If the Iranian really have extradited the al Qaeda forces they"arrested," then why do they refuse to publish a list of these individuals and where the now located? Who are those in Iranian "custody?" Iran refuses to say.

CIA director Porter Goss recently stated that he had an "excellent idea" where Bin Laden is. He said:

"...when you go to the very difficult question of dealing with sanctuaries in sovereign states, you're dealing with a problem of our sense of international obligation, fair play.

"We have to find a way to work in a conventional world in unconventional ways that are acceptable to the international community."

Iran is the likely sactuary of Bin Laden and almost certainly his key leadership. Iran knows that we understand this.

Therefore, this story is likely an attempt to confuse the world community and deny that Iran is behind the insurgency in Iraq. The statement was made the day before Iraqi leaders were to arrive in Iran.

India steps on pedal for Iran pipeline

Santanu Ghosh, India Express:

Spurred by Pakistan’s eagerness on the Iran-Pakistan-India pipeline, India has stepped on the gas pedal. In the end of July, India is getting into a fresh bilateral with Iran on the issue. READ MORE

Senior officials in the petroleum ministry said the Iranian side, headed by the deputy minister for international cooperation, will visit India around the end of the month. The Indian delegation will be headed by Petroleum Secretary S.C. Tripathi.

The basic agenda for the bilateral with Iran will be the issue of pricing of the piped gas. While the Iranian side will be briefed about the headway in the recent talks between India and Pakistan, financial, commercial and other issues will also be taken up, sources said.

‘‘The idea is to firm up the issue of pricing with Iran so that before the JWG of Pakistan and India meets in August, the basis for the trilateral agreement will be worked out,” they added.

A study has also been conducted by an international research firm on the issue of pricing of piped gas.

While India is pushing for a price of around $2 per MBtu for the piped gas, Iran is keen to link the piped gas price to the LNG prices which will work out to $3.5 per MBtu. Such a price is high for India. While Pakistan may accept that price for its power projects, it is unviable for its fertiliser units.

It is expected that the pricing issue will be thrashed out in the bilateral with Iran. India will then push for the tripartite agreement with Pakistan in August.

Gloomy EU to press on with Iran initiative

Paul Taylor, Reuters, SwissPolitics:

European Union foreign ministers will agree on Monday to press on with a diplomatic initiative to try to persuade Iran to abandon its nuclear ambitions despite gloom since the election of an Islamic hard-liner as president. READ MORE

EU diplomats said Britain, France, Germany and EU foreign policy chief Javier Solana would brief their colleagues on a package of economic and political incentives they plan to offer Tehran next month if it gives up uranium enrichment activities that could give it the atom bomb.

But the election of ultra-conservative Mahmoud Ahmadinejad as president and growing indications that Iran's pragmatic chief nuclear negotiator, Hassan Rohani, will be replaced, have made the Europeans increasingly pessimistic.

"There was legitimate skepticism even before the election about whether Iran would ever agree to abandon enrichment, but now it's looking much more difficult," an EU official said.

"Most people still want to proceed and present the comprehensive package in August, once Ahmadinejad takes office, so that Iran has a clear choice between the benefits of cooperation and the risks of isolation," he said.

The so-called EU3 have agreed to refer Iran to the U.N. Security Council for possible sanctions if it resumes frozen enrichment-related activities, as it has threatened to do.

"It is very, very difficult to see this ending up anywhere but in the Security Council," the official said.

Ahmandinejad has said Tehran will never give up its legal right to enrich nuclear fuel as part of a program it insists is for purely peaceful civilian purposes, but which the West suspects is aimed at developing a weapons capability.

NO REWARD

Diplomats said the EU package would include a promise of civilian nuclear cooperation and a guaranteed supply of nuclear fuel, a trade and cooperation agreement, regional security cooperation and recognition of Iran as a major energy supplier to Europe.

European Commission officials held an eighth round of trade talks in Tehran this week they said achieved progress on industrial cooperation, energy and intellectual property.

But most experts think the EU cannot offer Iran sufficiently juicy carrots to persuade it to abandon its nuclear ambitions unless the United States is willing to back the deal with an end to its own powerful national economic sanctions.

Washington took a small step to support the Europeans in March when it agreed to stop blocking Iran's bid to negotiate membership of the World Trade Organization and allow it to buy spare parts for its aging fleet of civil aircraft.

But U.S. officials say they see no grounds to reward Iran for choosing a president who is overtly hostile to the West in an electoral process it regards as undemocratic by offering more concessions to make the EU package more attractive.

Mark Leonard, director of foreign policy at the Center for European Reform think-tank, said in a research paper the EU strategy was to "force Iran to choose between nuclear weapons and its relationship with the West."

Ahmadinejad has so far argued that Iran, an oil-producing nation of 65 million which sees itself as a leader of the Muslim and developing world, has no need for closer ties with the West, especially the United States.

But EU officials say aside from public rhetoric they detect no change in Iran's foreign policy yet, partly because Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei remains in overall charge.

Leonard sketched five possible scenarios, ranging from a grand bargain between Iran and the West to a pre-emptive U.S. or Israeli air strike to try to prevent Tehran going nuclear.

"In the end, it may be impossible to avert a nuclear crisis, but Europeans must do all they can to try -- both to avoid the negative consequences of a nuclear Iran and to save the credibility of EU foreign policy and the translatlantic relationship," he said.

Iran,UK's 4th biggest market for credit guarantee

IranMania:

The British government's Export Credit Guarantee Department (ECGD) issued £99 mln ($182 m) financial support for UK companies doing business with Iran in the last fiscal year to March 2005.

The amount represented ECGD's fourth most active market, with Saudi Arabia continuing to dominate its business with guarantees totaling £759 mln, ahead of £150 mln supplied for projects in China and £149 mln for the US, IRNA reported. READ MORE

According to its latest annual report, the UK's official credit agency issued 113 guarantees and insurance policies to help British companies to compete in overseas markets during 2004-05.

The largest transactions underwritten in Iran were part of a $1.6 bln project to assist the downstream development of South Pars gas phases 9 and 10.

This involved supporting $54.5 mln worth of mechanical, piping and electrical equipment supplied by London-based Man engineers and $21 m worth of steel-related produced by the UK branch of Salzgitter Mannesmann.

ECGD said that oil, gas and petrochemicals business continues to be a major source of civil business for ECGD, with Iran [presently the major market for inquiries.

In recent years, the UK agency has started to support business to the National Iranian Oil Company and the National Petrochemical Company without a requirement of government guarantees or complex structured finance arrangements.

"Several smaller Iranian contracts were also completed this year and the flow of business is expected to continue with the increasing global demand for petrochemical products given Iran's large hydrocarbon reserves," its report said.

Other financing and insurance support included a project designed to improve the efficiency of electricity generation in the Iranian power sector.

This involved a £20 mln export contract to provide services and tooling to refurbish turbine generators blades undertaken by Doncasters, based in central England.

ECGD said the project included an element of technology transfer, which will enable the Iranian state power company in due course to undertake uture turbine upgrades itself.

Hunger striking Baduzade punished with 25 whiplashes by Iranian authorities

Dozame.org:

The Kurdish prisoner Cehangir Baduzade was punished with 25 whiplashes by the Iranian Urmiye prison administration. The reason behind the punishment was Baduzade's hunger strike and wish to be tried fair and openly.

On July 4, Baduzade was taken out from his cell and punished with 25 whiplashes on the prison yard.

Cehangir Baduzade started a hunger strike on June 24 to protest the false accusations of murdering a man that was made against him by Iranian authorities. Baduzade is demanding to be tried in a fair court. READ MORE

"I am not going to accept this oppression. As a struggle of freedom, I will hunger strike and I will continue until justice is given", Baduzade wrote in a earlier statement to the Kurdish news agency MHA.

Baduzade's wife Turan spoke to MHA.

"We are not allowed to see my husband since he started his hunger strike. We are worried for my husband's health. We know that his condition is very bad. PJAK members supporting my husband are also being punished severely and their families are not allowed to see them either", she said.

Prison guards have told Baduzade that it's not their fault that he can't speak with his family on the phone. "It's the prison administration that has forbidden us to let you talk to your family", they said to Baduzade.

The PJAK supporter Cehangir Baduzade is being held in the Urmiye prison of eastern Kurdistan (northwestern Iran) on false accusations of murdering a man in Urmiye upon his return from exile in southern Kurdistan. Baduzade was arrested by Iranian Pasdaran soldiers and tortured for 45 days. When he didn't accept the charges put against him, he was instead charged for carrying a gun and sentenced to 3 years in prison.

Even though there are no proofs that Baduzade had committed the murder, an Islamic court in Urmiye requested the death sentence for Baduzade. The court in Urmiye is now waiting for 'green light' from Tehran to carry out the death sentence.

Baduzade, who is also known as Husheng Ehmed Shikak, had for many years been active in the Democratic Party of Iran. He later left the organization and moved with his family to southern (Iraqi) Kurdistan and was given refugee status by the United Nations.

After many years, Baduzade returned together with his wife and children to eastern (Iranian) Kurdistan from his exile. Upon his return to Urmiye, Baduzade was arrested by Iranian Pasdaran soldiers, accused of murder, a crime he didn't commit.

Baduzade's hunger strike is now on its 16th day. (as of July 10th)

The South African link to Iran's nukes

Christopher Holton, World Tribune:

BOOK REVIEW: Iran’s Nuclear Option, by Al J. Venter © Casemate Publishing 2005.

The threat from Iran is beginning to garner more and more media attention as revelations about Iran’s involvement with Al Qaida and its nuclear weapons program come to light. For anyone concerned with or interested in the Islamic Republic of Iran, Al J. Venter’s Iran’s Nuclear Option is an indispensable work.

Not only does Venter do a masterful job of detailing the history and progress of Iran’s quest to build the Bomb, he also reveals—in some cases for the first time—the degree to which Iran has fooled the world about its nuclear program. Most importantly, Venter provides details about Pakistan’s Dr. A.Q. Khan’s assistance for Iran’s program and, in a little known revelation, how post-apartheid South Africa played a key role in moving Iran’s bomb program along. READ MORE

The South African connection detailed in the book should serve to alter the conventional wisdom that post-apartheid South Africa is squeaky clean in terms of its now-defunct weapons program. The link between South Africa and Iran alone makes the book worth buying.

In a way, the title of this book is somewhat misleading. It actually goes way beyond Iran’s nuclear program and provides remarkable background on the theocracy in Tehran, its philosophy and its history. It also goes into useful detail to fully explain and describe Iran’s ballistic missile program. It covers Iran’s other weapons of mass destruction, and provides insight into the Pasdaran, Iran’s Revolutionary Guards.

And no book on modern Iran would be complete without an analysis of Iran’s role as the world’s most active sponsor of terrorism. Venter does a great job of this, including information on an Al Qaida-Hezbollah axis, made possible by Iran.

Iran’s Nuclear Option should be considered a definitive work on Iran and the serious threat that it poses to the U.S., Middle East and world security. No national security or Middle East library could be complete without it.

Arabs see Iran election result as bad for Middle East peace: Survey

Iran Focus:

A recent survey conducted by a research and studies website run in the United Arab Emirates found that the majority of Arabs believe that the rise of ultra-conservative Mahmoud Ahmadinejad to Iran’s presidency will have a negative impact on stability in the Middle East, the prominent UK-based Arabic-language website Elaph reported yesterday.

Elaph said that the survey carried out by the Centre for Strategic Information and Studies in the UAE found that 64.91 percent of the 1,855 people interviewed thought that “the result of the recent presidential elections in Iran will negatively affect stability in the region”. READ MORE

Only 25.88 percent of those surveyed said that they believed the Iranian elections would have a positive impact, while just under 10 percent offered a neutral answer.

Elaph said that the negative Arab sentiment came because of Ahmadinejad’s record as a hardliner, Iran’s pursuit of nuclear weapons, and in particular after recent threats by Iran’s Foreign Ministry spokesman Hamid-Reza Asefi, directed against Arab states.

Earlier this month, Asefi said in his weekly press conference, "The countries of this region must know that they will suffer more than us from this kind of action as the capabilities of different countries are not of the same magnitude".

The threat came after the publication of a caricature in a Bahraini daily mocking Iran’s Supreme Leader.

In response, the Secretary-General of the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) sharply criticised Iran’s Foreign Ministry for using threatening language against GCC member Bahrain.

“Such remarks by this official [Asefi] have no correlation with logic or political principals governing relations between states”, Abdur-Rahman Al-Atiya, Secretary-General of the GCC, said.

He said the Iranian Foreign Ministry’s position ran contrary to the principle of “freedom of expression, which is the primary wish of the Iranian people”.

Friday's Daily Briefing on Iran

DoctorZin reports, 7.15.2005:

Ganji's Second Letter to the Free People of the World

Akbar Ganji, FreeGanji.blogspot.com: in his own words.

This candle is dying out, but its voice will not

Today, Sunday July 10, 2005 exactly 30 days have passed since I started my hunger strike. In two phases of hunger strike (11 days in late May, and 30 days since June 11) my weight has reduced from 77kg to 55kg, which is a loss of 22kg in 41 days. Many inside and outside the country ask why I have gone on hunger strike and why I am trying to reach legitimate ends through self-destruction. ... Here I shall try, despite the extreme physical weakness that has completely worn me out, to share my views clearly with everyone. READ MORE

For those wondering why this man would be willing to die rather than keep his silence, read this letter. In it he shares his view of man, governments, competing ideologies, why the Islamic Republic has failed and why he chooses death rather than submit any longer.

His ideas and those like them of other dissidents are the seeds of a new Iran. The Persian version of the letter.

Here are a few other news items you may have missed.

• Michael Ledeen, National Review reported on the silence of so many to the plight of Iranian dissident's such as Akbar Ganji, as well as the growing unrest in Iran and the recent evidence of Iran’s support for bin Laden and al Qaeda. A must read. Dan Darling has a follow up post.
• The Voice of America outlined the views of the United States government on Akbar Ganji.
• Yahoo News reported that the pressure on as jailed Iranian dissident hints death is near.
• Gulf Daily News reported that Iran's judiciary said yesterday hunger-striking jailed journalist Akbar Ganji would not be released.
• FrontPage Magazine called for the release of Iranian dissident Ganji.
• Yahoo News reported that the State Department said it was disturbed by reports that peaceful protesters who demonstrated in support of a jailed Iranian dissident were treated brutally by Iranian police.
• IranMania reported that Iraqi Shiite Prime Minister Ibrahim Jaafari is to travel to Iran on Saturday.
• Iran Focus reported that at least 200 agents of Iran’s State Security Forces on Monday conducted a midnight raid in the central park in Tabriz, arresting anyone in sight.
• Council on Foreign Relations reported Henry A. Kissinger as saying, says that if Iran secures nuclear weapons, nonproliferation may cease to be a meaningful policy.
• Yahoo News reported that President Mohammad Khatami said, "We are further from it (a resumption of dialogue) today than we have been for some years," and that "The United States must take the first step."
• Iranian blogger, Nazanin Namdar, Roozonline reported the deputy police chief said “one cannot deny torture in detention centers.” He is quick to add that “… it is an illegal act.”
• Roozonline reported that at Tuesday's demonstration in support of Ganji the military was under strict orders to engage protestors and would see to it that such demonstrations were put to an end.
• Iranian blogger, Ali Mohammad Abtahi, Webneveshteha reported Khatami as saying, I ask Ganji to write a letter asking for freedom and I ask Ayatollah Shahroodi to set him free.
• Christian Science Monitor reported that Iranian journalists say they have been instructed by judiciary officials in recent days not to write about the Ganji case. Plus an excerpt of one of Ganji's letters from prison.
• Axis Information and Analysis reported a Russian official as saying, Iran in fact is an island of a relative stability in the center of perhaps the most unstable region in the world.
• International Relations and Security Network reported that Argentina now admits failure in the bomb probe that implicated Iran in a 1994 attack on a Jewish center there.
• Fourth World War reported that a junior member of the State Department's Policy Planning staff is blocking the expenditure of $3 million to promote pro-Western democratic forces in Iran.
• The Washington Times reported that Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's presence is already felt in the political circles and the streets of Tehran. Since his election, under the banner of a renewed Islamic revolution, the clerical regime hanged six people and sentenced another to death in the past week alone.
• Eli Lake, The NY Sun reported that as three senators joined President Bush's call for the Iranian regime to release dissident journalist Akbar Ganji from prison, the secretary-general of the United Nations, Kofi Annan, yesterday refused to comment as did Senator Lugar.
• And finally, the latest photo of Ganji in prison and another cartoon.