Thursday's Daily Briefing on Iran

DoctorZin reports, 3.02.2006:

Preliminary investigation blames Iran for the attack on the Shiite Shrine in Samarra.

• Iran Focus reported that the deputy governor of the Iraqi province of Saladin, where the holy city of Samarra is situated, said preliminary investigation was pointing to Iran’s role in the bombing of the city’s revered Shiite shrine last week.
  

Iran Tests Missile with 4000 Kilometer range.

• Middle East Newsline reported that Iran launched a Shihab-4 missile, designed to have a range of 4,000 kilometers. Watch out Europe.

Shocking! Iran/Moscow talks fail, again.

• Reuters reported that Russian and Iranian negotiators met in Moscow on to reach a compromise on the Russian nuclear proposal.
• Dow Jones Newswires reported that Russia and Iran have failed to achieve any breakthrough in their talks.

Reza Pahlavi steps up efforts to support an internal regime change in Iran.

• Reza Pahlavi's Secretariat, PR Newswire Association reported that Reza Pahlavi, at the National Press Club, challenged the ongoing debate between proponents of military action versus diplomacy, instead appealing to the "free world to support the thousand circles of localized dissent and opposition that readily exists in Iran."
• United Press International added that Reza Pahlavi argued in his NPC speech that "[Western diplomats] are operating under the false assumption that the other side wants a solution."

The Problems with the Voice of America and Radio Farda.

• Ilan Berman, The American Spectator applauded the US administration's C-change in its approach to Iran but warned that Voice of America and Radio Farda suffer from serious systemic dysfunctions.

Why Iranians Distrust the Brits.

• The Guardian examined the nearly universal belief in Iran that the Brits are behind nearly every major event in Iran and why.

A flood of reports from inside of Iran.

• Mehran Riazaty reported that Iran's Supreme Leader said an Islamic government has been formed in Iraq.
• Mehran Riazaty reported that Ayatollah Mesbah Yazdi (Ahmadinejad's mentor) published his views on Martyrdom Operations on his website.
• BBC News reported that ex-Iranian President Mohammad Khatami has called the Holocaust a historical reality.
• Iran Focus reported that a senior commander in the Bassij has been named the new head of the IRGC’s secretive Ansar-ol-Mahdi Protection Corps, whose officers are entrusted with weapons of mass of destruction and terrorist activities beyond Iran’s borders.
• Middle East Newsline reported Iran has expanded the authority of the Basij militia to include police, defense and relief operations.
• Rooz Online reported that in response to the revelations made several days ago by Hassan Rohani about the Iranian leaderships numerous attempts to hide details of its nuclear program from the IAEA, hard-liners are claiming his words threaten national security.
• Rooz Online reported that Ahmadinejad's government has been asking local governments to focus on "short term" development projects in hope that people would regain their trust in their elected officials.
• Rooz Online reported that Ahmadinejad's ultra-hardline government has decided to review the employment contracts of university professors deemed to be “un-Islamic”.
• Rooz Online reported that that soon Ahmadinejad’s cleansing process of the banking system will be complete.
• Rooz Online reported that Iran’s Ministry of Intelligence has classified domestic and foreign-based Iranian web blogs to determine whether and when a web-blog will be denied access from internet users from inside Iran.
• Rooz Online reported that a group of Iranian women have decided to ignore an unwritten and illegitimate order that has banned them from attending soccer games.

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

• Radio Free Europe reported that President Bush said Iran "shall not have the means, the knowledge, to develop a nuclear weapon."
• The Wall Street Journal reported that a forthcoming report by IAEA Director-General Mohamed ElBaradei on Iran's nuclear programs offers evidence of a cover-up as alarming as anything a pulp novelist could dream up.
• Yahoo News reported that Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak said he had advised the United States against attacking Iran.
• David Ignatius, The Washington Post examined why the world is treating India's nuclear program differently than Iran's.
• And finally, The Jerusalem Post reported that Israel will find ways to block the flow of Iranian money into the West Bank if Teheran attempts give a Hamas-led Palestinian Authority 250 million dollars.