Iranian Alert -- November 10, 2003 -- IRAN LIVE THREAD PING LIST

The US media almost entirely ignores news regarding the Islamic Republic of Iran. As Tony Snow of the Fox News Network has put it, “this is probably the most under-reported news story of the year.” But most American’s are unaware that the Islamic Republic of Iran is NOT supported by the masses of Iranians today. Modern Iranians are among the most pro-American in the Middle East.

There is a popular revolt against the Iranian regime brewing in Iran today. Starting June 10th of this year, Iranians have begun taking to the streets to express their desire for a regime change. Most want to replace the regime with a secular democracy. Many even want the US to over throw their government.

The regime is working hard to keep the news about the protest movement in Iran from being reported. Unfortunately, the regime has successfully prohibited western news reporters from covering the demonstrations. The voices of discontent within Iran are sometime murdered, more often imprisoned. Still the people continue to take to the streets to demonstrate against the regime.

In support of this revolt, Iranians in America have been broadcasting news stories by satellite into Iran. This 21st century news link has greatly encouraged these protests. The regime has been attempting to jam the signals, and locate the satellite dishes. Still the people violate the law and listen to these broadcasts. Iranians also use the Internet and the regime attempts to block their access to news against the regime. In spite of this, many Iranians inside of Iran read these posts daily to keep informed of the events in their own country.

This daily thread contains nearly all of the English news reports on Iran. It is thorough. If you follow this thread you will witness, I believe, the transformation of a nation. This daily thread provides a central place where those interested in the events in Iran can find the best news and commentary. The news stories and commentary will from time to time include material from the regime itself. But if you read the post you will discover for yourself, the real story of what is occurring in Iran and its effects on the war on terror.

I am not of Iranian heritage. I am an American committed to supporting the efforts of those in Iran seeking to replace their government with a secular democracy. I am in contact with leaders of the Iranian community here in the United States and in Iran itself.

If you read the daily posts you will gain a better understanding of the US war on terrorism, the Middle East and why we need to support a change of regime in Iran. Feel free to ask your questions and post news stories you discover in the weeks to come.

If all goes well Iran will be free soon and I am convinced become a major ally in the war on terrorism. The regime will fall. Iran will be free. It is just a matter of time.

PS I have a daily ping list and a breaking news ping list. If you would like to receive alerts to these stories please let me know which list you would like to join.

HOW TO MAKE IT HAPPEN

By AMIR TAHERI
NY Post
November 10, 2003

WILL they stay the course? This is the question that many in the Middle East are again asking with regard to the U.S. presence in Iraq. In recent weeks, the number of observers answering in the negative has grown daily.
The assumption is that the American public, prompted by the antiwar section of the media, is having second thoughts about the wisdom of intervention in Iraq. Basing their strategy on that assumption, Arab radical groups of various ideological shades are mobilizing their resources in support of the terrorist campaign in Iraq.

A new coalition is emerging whose aim is not only to drive the United States out, but also to prevent the emergence of a democracy in Iraq. Diehard Saddamites, remnants of the pan-Arabist movement and various Islamist terrorist outfits, including some linked with Al Qaeda, form the new anti-democracy coalition in Iraq.

"Our aim is not only to drive the forces of occupation [out of Iraq]," reads a statement issued by the Ansar al-Sunnah (Victors of Sunnism), a group that claims to be behind some of the attacks against U.S. forces near Baghdad. "The real issue is to prevent the Americans from imposing [a system] on Iraq in which mortal men claim powers that belong to the Almighty."

It seems that President Bush understands "the real issue."

In his speech at the National Endowment for Democracy Thursday, Bush ignored the conjectural issues that dominate the Iraq debate and put the conflict in the broader context of the war that democracy has fought against despotism for over 2,500 years.

He presented intervention in Iraq as part of the same pattern of moral and military commitment that the United States, as a standard-bearer of democracy in the modern world, showed in helping rebuild and defend the democratic nations of post-war Western Europe, protecting them from Communism during the Cold War and combating Communism in Latin America, Europe and Asia.

The president made two important points.

The first is that the promotion of democracy is an imperative of U.S. national security. As long as there are despotic states that shelter, and often sponsor, terrorists, America will remain threatened in its own heartland.

The second is that it is impossible to turn Iraq into a lone democracy in a dangerous neighborhood of despotic and predatory regimes. Such an Iraq would have to devote the lion's share of its resources to developing a military machine to discourage bullying and/or direct attack by some of those neighbors. That would, in turn, throw the economy off balance, tempt the military to intervene in politics and lead to the return of the "moustaches" to power, albeit in a lighter version.

For Iraq to become a stable democracy, it is imperative that other nations in the region also embark on democratization.

Bush is right in saying that Muslims are no less entitled to freedom from despotism than the nations liberated from Fascism and Communism.

He is also right in asserting that different countries could be guided toward democracy in different ways. Iraq under Saddam Hussein was an exception because he had destroyed all internal mechanisms for reform. This is not the case in most other Middle Eastern nations that suffer under undemocratic regimes.

In other words, there is no need for direct U.S. military intervention to break the logjam created by systems that belong to another age.

WITHOUT practical policies to speed up democratization in the Middle East, however, this new "Bush Doctrine" will remain a pious hope. To translate his vision into realities on the ground, the president must make a number of moves.

To start with, he must unite his administration behind a Middle East policy that puts democratization at the top of the agenda. This is not now the case.

The State Department is still obsessed with the status quo and the dream of secret deals with Tehran and Damascus. It also shies away from anything that might offend Saudi and Egyptian governments.

The Pentagon, for its part, is so focused on the military aspects of the transition in Iraq that, despite Deputy Secretary of Defense Paul Wolfowitz's intellectual input, it often loses sight of the political aspects of the president's grander strategy.

The next move should be a reassessment of relations with the nations of the region. These can be divided into three groups:

* Friends of America who have embarked upon democratization. Mauritania, Morocco, Jordan, Yemen, Kuwait, Bahrain, Qatar, the United Arab Emirates and Oman fall into this category. None could be described as a proper democracy. But each in its own way is engaged in a process that could, in time, produce an acceptable democratic system.

The United States must deepen relations with nations in this group, both individually and collectively, and press for speedier reform.

* Countries whose ruling elites profess U.S. friendship while their policies provoke or even encourage anti-Americanism. These include Tunisia, Egypt and Saudi Arabia. There are genuine constituencies for democratization in all three, including inside the ruling elites.

The United States should identify those constituencies, establish working relations with them, and cancel the blank checks it had had to sign during the Cold War.

* Countries whose regimes regard America as their strategic enemy, while the people are sympathetic to American values as they perceive them. The Sudan, Libya, Syria and Iran fall into this category.

These regimes must be treated as pariahs, with the United States and its allies throwing their moral and political support behind pro-democracy opposition movements.

We have left three countries out. One is Turkey, a developing democracy and longterm U.S. ally. Another is Algeria, where pro-democracy forces are strong but have virtually no contact with the United States. The third is Lebanon which, once it shakes off the Syrian military presence, would join the group of developing democracies in the region.

Next, the United States should promote a diplomatic process aimed at committing the nations of the region to a system of values and a set of rules in the conduct of both domestic and foreign policies.

Those that enter the process and sign accords, similar to the Helsinki Accords between the West and the Communist bloc in the final phase of the Cold War, would receive greater diplomatic deference, economic aid, preferential trade agreements, and the privilege of political consultation on regional affairs.

Those that do not will be isolated, subjected to political, cultural and economic sanctions - and, when necessary, faced with credible military pressure.

IRAQ is but one piece, albeit an important one, in a jigsaw puzzle that, when completed, would produce a Middle East committed to new system of governance based on the rule of law, human rights, pluralistic politics and an enterprise-based economy.

That would free over 300 million Muslims from tyranny, terror and poverty - and also enhance America's security. This is a cause worth fighting for.

E-mail: amirtaheri@benadorassociates.com

http://www.nypost.com/postopinion/opedcolumnists/10365.htm

Iran frees Berkeley lecturer
Teacher had been held on spy charges

SF Chronicle
Charlie Goodyear, Chronicle Staff Writer
Monday, November 10, 2003

A UC Berkeley lecturer held for nearly four months in an Iranian prison on espionage charges was released on Sunday and is prepared to fight a legal battle to clear his name, his friends and family members said.

Dariush Zahedi, 37, was freed on $250,000 bail paid by his family and is still subject to a criminal prosecution. He was arrested on July 10 while on an annual trip to visit relatives.

Although Zahedi, a vocal critic of the Iranian government, is now technically free to leave his native country, friends and family said Sunday that he intends to hire a lawyer and stay to face his accusers.

"That's his mind-set,'' said Hooshang Amirahmadi, a Rutgers University professor who spoke with Zahedi on Sunday. "He thinks that he's innocent and he needs to clean his record.

"I think Dr. Zahedi will be cleared. If the case of spying was really serious, no amount of bail would have gotten him released. They just wanted to keep his mouth shut.''

Authorities at the Iranian mission to the United Nations in New York did not return calls seeking to confirm Zahedi's release and to comment on Sunday. The U.S. State Department also did not confirm his release.

Zahedi was arrested when he agreed to speak with a political freedom movement in Iran. His arrest came as student protests and international criticism of Iran's nuclear weapons program were placing increased pressure on the Islamic regime in Tehran.

According to news reports, Zahedi was suspected of masterminding student protests. He had traveled to Iran on dates that coincided with anniversaries of the 1999 pro-democracy student demonstrations, according to the reports.

Zahedi was jailed at Evin prison, north of Tehran, where Zahra Kazemi, an Iranian Canadian journalist, died in custody in July following her arrest for taking photos of student protests.

Careful in conversation

On Sunday, Zahedi was careful not to discuss details of his detention in several phone calls to relatives and friends for fear that Iranian authorities might be listening, according to those who spoke with him.

"He has been under pressure, all kinds of threats and so on,'' Amirahmadi said. "I personally cannot confirm whether he was tortured or not. I asked him how it was. He basically said it was suitable -- OK. He is doing quite well, to my surprise. His spirits are quite high.''

He knows of no trial date set in the case.

Zahedi, a naturalized U.S. citizen who lives in Lafayette, is the author of "The Iranian Revolution Then and Now: Indicators of Regime Instability." A graduate of UC Davis and the University of Southern California, he teaches Middle Eastern politics at UC Berkeley and Santa Clara University.

Officials at UC Berkeley could not be reached for comment Sunday.

Zahedi and Amirahmadi are active in the American Iranian Council, a nonpartisan, nonprofit group devoted to improving U.S. relations with Iran. Amirahmadi is the founder and president and Zahedi is the West Coast director of operations for the group, whose honorary chairman is former U.S. Secretary of State Cyrus Vance.

Zahedi's stepfather, who lives in the Bay Area and asked not to be named, got a call from Zahedi early Sunday morning just after his release.

"He sounded OK to me,'' the stepfather said. "I am happy to hear his voice.''

Another relative, who had a brief conversation with Zahedi, said, "I just asked him how he was. I don't think he was comfortable talking on the phone. I asked him if he could come back here. He said he didn't know.''

Staying with family

Zahedi is staying in Tehran with his mother and brother, relatives said. He is reportedly reluctant to talk publicly about his arrest to avoid damaging his chances of winning in court.

His case has been closely watched by human rights organizations and the U.S. government, although a spokeswoman for the State Department said on Sunday she could not comment on Zahedi's release.

And his arrest appears to have intensified divisions within the Iranian government between reformists and fundamentalist clerics.

Amirahmadi said Iran's Ministry of Information, which first arrested Zahedi, ultimately cleared him of spying. But the country's hard-line Department of Justice then took over the case. Amirahmadi said Zahedi's release could signal that the Iranian government is looking for a face-saving way to drop the matter altogether.

"He is not a spy,'' the professor added. "But he is certainly a critic of the regime.''

E-mail Charlie Goodyear at cgoodyear@sfchronicle.com.

http://sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2003/11/10/ZAHEDI.TMP

Iranian Confirms Iran Responsible For Argentinian Bombing Attack

TruthNews.net
Gary Fitleberg, November 9, 2003

Iran, one of America’s declared "axis of evil" nations, is one of the top state sponsors of terrorism internationally. Its influence internationally reaches not only Israel and the Middle East but even extends to South America. Like Iraq, will Iran eventually face a military attack? If it continues on a destructive path it definitely will. It is only a matter of time!!!

An Iranian witness confirmed the government of Iran was exclusively responsible for the 1994 bombing of the Jewish AMIA community center in Buenos Aires that killed 85 people and wounded hundreds, court sources said.

Abolgasem Mesbahi, known as "Witness C," testified via a video conference from the Argentine Embassy in Berlin, Germany, in the public trial being held in Buenos Aires on the alleged local connection in the attack.

Mesbahi, former chief of the Iranian intelligence service, said "nobody" in Argentina was involved or collaborated "in the logistics or in information in the attack." He said the van stashed with explosives used in the attack had been hired for the purpose.

Iran "did not use local workers" for these attacks, Mesbahi said.

Mesbahi a year ago told the Argentine judiciary about an alleged payment of 10 million dollars made to an emissary of then-president Carlos Menem for him to cover up Teheran's alleged role in the AMIA attack.

In his testimony, Mesbahi reiterated his charge, saying a "special envoy" sent to Iran by Menem, president of Argentina from 1989-1999, arranged the 10-million-dollar cover-up payment.

The money "was to go to the pockets of [ex] president Menem to halt the campaign" against Iran, Mesbahi said.

However, Mesbahi said he was not aware that the payment had actually been made. He tried to soften his statements saying everything about the payment had been told to him by a person who later died.

Mesbahi said he "had never in his life seen" Menem's alleged envoy. Mesbahi's testimony appeared to contradict what he said last year when he gave a detailed description of the alleged emissary.

Mesbahi said the AMIA center was targeted because the Iranian cultural envoy in Buenos Aires at the time, Moshen Rabbani, had information that it served as a base for the Israeli intelligence agency Mossad.

Mesbahi said it was Rabbani who hired the van used in the attack.

"It's a rule that in terrorist operations local sources of the chosen country can never be trusted. It is not possible that anyone who lived in Argentina was involved in or informed about the attack," Mesbahi said.

His testimony could favor Argentine defendants accused of preparing and handing in the vehicle used in the attack and of other details.

He said that after the attack, lobby groups were used in Argentina to block negative propaganda against Iran, which was of great concern for Teheran.

Iran must learn a lesson that it can no longer afford to be a state supporter of terrorism anywhere. Iran must be held accountable for all its actions internationally.

Iran, defiant and self-destructive, can change its course of heading down the same road as its neighbor and nemesis Iraq before it is to late to change its eventual fate!!!

Gary Fitleberg is a Political Analyst specializing in International Relations with emphasis on Middle East affairs.

Copyright © 2003 Gary Fitleberg

http://www.truthnews.net/world/2003110029.htm

Iran's nuclear ambitions spark growing domestic debate

Channel NewsAsia's
Iran Correspondent Roxana Saberi
11.10.2003

Tehran : Iran is waiting for a response from the International Atomic Energy Agency, which is reviewing Tehran's nuclear programme.

The UN's nuclear watchdog says it will take a while to analyse documents handed over by Tehran, which are intended to prove Iran's nuclear programme is peaceful.

Meanwhile, in the Islamic Republic of Iran, debate is growing over the nation's nuclear ambitions.

These hardliners in the Iranian capital claim Reformists in their government are bowing to international demands.

They believe other countries will seize what they say is Iran's sovereign right to pursue nuclear technology.

This stance has led to tension within the international community, which wants Iran to spell out its position on the nuclear question.

The IAEA had given Iran until October 31st to clarify what is going on.

That deadline helped prompt Tehran to reach an agreement last month in Iran with the foreign ministers of England, France, and Germany.

Hassan Rohani, Iran's Supreme National Security Council, said: "Agreements between Europe and Iran will lead us to overcome the current tensions over Iran's nuclear matters."

At the time, Iran announced it will sign up to stricter international inspections of its nuclear sites and temporarily suspend its uranium enrichment programme key demands of the UN Nuclear Agency.

International pressure had grown after inspectors found traces of weapons-grade enriched uranium at two sites in Iran.

Tehran blames contaminated equipment it bought from abroad.

Under the deal, the European ministers agreed Iran can expect help with civilian nuclear technology it has been requesting.

Dominiqe de Villepin, French Foreign Minister, said: "This is a promising start in which everyone has to play his part."

If the IAEA decides Iran has not proven its peaceful nuclear intentions, it could refer Iran's case to the UN Security Council.

That could mean sanctions which has put Iran in a tight spot, squeezed by international pressure and a growing debate at home.

"What's clear is that Iran has surrendered, under international pressure. And they're losing a point," said one Iranian in Tehran.

"I think that our leaders used good diplomacy. And no, we can't interpret it this way that we have surrendered," said another.

Iran claims it is pursuing nuclear energy simply to meet the demands of its growing population.

But if the UN's nuclear watchdog agency finds otherwise when it meets on November 20th, the situation will likely intensify. - CNA

Copyright © 2003 MCN International Pte Ltd

http://www.channelnewsasia.com/stories/middleeast/view/56501/1/.html

Iran accepts IAEA nuclear demands

Al Jazerra.net
Monday 10 November 2003, 16:43 Makka Time, 13:43 GMT

Under intense international pressure, Iran has temporarily halted uranium enrichment and will sign the additional protocol to allow snap nuclear inspections, an official said on Monday.

Hasan Ruhani, who handles Iran's nuclear affairs, told Russian President Vladimir Putin that the Islamic republic had agreed to the UN nuclear watchdog's conditions.

"Before your government I officially announce that today we are giving to the IAEA (International Atomic Energy Agency) a letter agreeing with the additional protocol.

From today we are temporarily suspending our process of uranium enrichment," Ruhani, the head of Iran's Supreme National Security Council, told Putin.

The halting of uranium enrichment, a process to create material that can be used to make an atomic bomb, is one of a number of demands set by the IAEA for Iran to allay fears about its nuclear activities.

At a meeting with IAEA chief Muhammad ElBaradai on Saturday, Ruhani had promised to hand over the letters accepting the UN body's demands.

"They (the IAEA) gave us to understand that they had no further questions that Iran had not already answered," added Ruhani at his Kremlin meeting with Putin.

Putin's 'pleasure'

Putin responded that Iran had a right to a uranium enrichment programme, but was happy to hear news that it was being suspended.

"With regard to the enrichment of uranium, Iran has a right to carry out these kinds of activities but we note with pleasure that Iran has itself resolved to limit itself," Putin said.

By signing the key additional protocol to the Non-Proliferation Treaty, Iran allows snap inspections of its nuclear sites.

It would be a major step forward to solving a months-long standoff with the IAEA over its nuclear programme.

Despite US accusations that Iran is seeking to develop nuclear weapons, Russia is helping Tehran build an $800 million nuclear reactor in Bushehr. Iran says its atomic programme is entirely peaceful.

Putin added, "I do not see any obstacles to cooperating with Iran in the nuclear sphere."

http://english.aljazeera.net/NR/exeres/79917BDC-A07B-4EAB-93C7-C12E751B299C.htm

OF MULLAHS AND THEIR NUKES

A deadly problem out of Iran

by Amir Taheri
NATIONAL REVIEW
November 10, 2003

Until last spring, it seemed as if Iran and the United States were moving toward a discreet dialogue designed to defuse more than two decades of antagonism. Now, however, with the release of fresh evidence that Iran may be pursuing nuclear weapons, tensions between the old adversaries have reached a new high.

Ask any official in Tehran and you will hear the same thing: Iran does not plan to manufacture nuclear weapons but wants to reserve the right to do so. This is almost word for word what the late shah told a group of scientists and officials in Tehran in 1970, shortly after Iran signed the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty. A few weeks later, the Iranian Atomic Agency was reorganized into a major government department headed by a deputy prime minister.

At the time, the shah's goal was to build 20 nuclear power stations over a ten-year period, producing a total of 30,000 megawatts of atomic energy. The reason was that Iran's energy consumption was expected to triple by the year 2000. At that rate, Iran would have been forced to use practically all of its oil output to generate electricity for domestic consumption, thus losing its single-largest source of foreign currency. The shah also invested in a new company, Eurodif, to find and market uranium in partnership with France, Italy, Spain, Belgium, and Gabon. (It was not until the late 1970s that uranium deposits were found in Iran itself, and thus Tehran initially looked to West Africa as a source of supply.)

By 1976, work on the first of the projected nuclear power stations had started at Bushehr, a peninsula on the Persian Gulf. The station was slated for completion in 1980. In 1977, research began at another nuclear power station at Dar-Khuywayyen, near Ahvaz, in the oil-rich province of Khuzistan. But in 1979, the shah's regime collapsed as Ayatollah Ruhallah Khomeini seized power in Tehran.

One of Khomeini's first acts was to scrap the entirety of the shah's grandiose modernization program — including the nuclear project. In 1983, a squadron of French heavy bombers attacked the Bushehr nuclear power station, damaging its abandoned infrastructure. The planes, painted in Iraqi colors, had been "lent" to Saddam Hussein by the French government and were flown by retired French and Belgian pilots. The raid was presented by then-president Saddam Hussein as retaliation for the destruction of the Iraqi nuclear power station at Osirak in 1981, though everyone knew that Osirak had been knocked out by Israeli Phantom jets painted in Iranian colors.

After Khomeini's death in 1989, his successors decided to revive the late shah's modernization programs. An inspection team dispatched in 1990 by the German company Siemens, which had started building the Bushehr plant before the revolution, reported that it could be revived and completed: Apparently the French pilots had not done as good a job at Bushehr as the Israelis had at Osirak.

Under pressure from Washington, however, the Germans quickly withdrew their offer to complete Bushehr. For almost three years, Iran shopped around, looking for partners to help finish the project. Russia agreed to help, in exchange for an $800 million contract. And so, by the year 2000, Bushehr was a bustling construction site. Nuclear power from Bushehr is scheduled to enter the nation's electrical network by March 2004.

The U.S. has alleged for some time that Iran has already begun manufacturing atomic bombs and may have up to ten such bombs by 2005. Until recently, international opinion was prepared to give Iran the benefit of the doubt, seeing Washington's position as "typical American bullying." A series of incidents has changed that view. Last March, satellite photos were released showing secret facilities linked to Iran's nuclear program. At one location near Natanz, close to the central Iranian desert, stands a sophisticated facility that produces high-speed centrifuges needed for enriching uranium. To produce a Hiroshima-sized bomb, it takes a maximum of 25 kilos of enriched uranium — for which 1,000 centrifuges are needed. It is estimated that the Natanz facility, when completed, will have the capacity to produce up to 5,000 centrifuges every year.

Even more interestingly, it appears that Iran wants to expand its nuclear options, limited currently to enriched uranium, to include the capacity to produce plutonium — a revival of the two-track strategy devised in the 1970s. To do this, Iran would need to produce heavy water. And the latest satellite photos and other intelligence material show that Iran has built a heavy-water facility at Arak, west of Tehran.

Both the Natanz and Arak facilities represent upper links in a chain of nuclear technology. The first link of that chain is raw uranium, which Iran discovered in the late 1970s in large quantities at Sarcheshmeh, near Kerman, and Magas, in Baluchestan. According to some estimates, Iran has one of the world's largest uranium deposits — large enough to satisfy the country's energy needs and to sustain any weapons programs it might wish to undertake for up to 200 years.

The middle link of the chain consists of nuclear stations like Bushehr, which — using uranium to produce electricity — also manufacture spent nuclear fuel, the raw material for enriched uranium. The highest link, of course, is a bomb-making factory, which Iran may or may not already have. One theory is that Iran will not build such a facility until it has accumulated enough enriched uranium and plutonium for a substantial number of nuclear warheads. Some experts believe that the go-ahead could be given as early as 2005. Others suggest slightly later dates, such as 2010.

As a signatory of the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT), Iran is obliged to undergo inspections by the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA). Last summer, Iran's credibility was badly shaken when IAEA inspectors found traces of enriched uranium at one of the sites they visited. The Iranians could not explain the presence of special-grade enriched uranium in a country that does not wish to manufacture nuclear warheads. Things worsened when the IAEA was confronted with evidence of the existence of the Natanz and Arak facilities. The question had to be asked: If Iran was not pursuing nuclear weapons, why all the secrecy? Consider Arak. Heavy water has well-known civilian uses: If the production at Arak was entirely innocent, why did Iran choose to conceal its existence? IAEA director Mohamed El-Baradei asked Iran to explain the latest findings.

El-Baradei's plea was followed by a letter signed by the British, French, and German foreign ministers calling on Iran to cooperate with the IAEA and to sign an additional protocol to the NPT allowing impromptu inspections of all suspected sites. The European Union also intervened, promising Iran financial and technological aid for its energy project in exchange for an immediate end to all military-related nuclear programs. Failing that, the EU could employ economic and diplomatic sanctions. Ironically, Washington adopted a softer position: The Bush administration said it would be satisfied if Iran signed the additional protocol to the NPT.

Faced with the EU's surprisingly tough stance, the Iranian leadership met with the foreign ministers of Britain, France, and Germany in Tehran on October 21. The result was an announcement by Hasan Rowhani, secretary of Iran's Supreme National Security Council, that Iran would sign the additional protocol allowing unlimited access to inspectors. Furthermore, Rowhani announced that Iran would, for an "interim period," suspend uranium enrichment "to express its goodwill and create a new atmosphere of trust."

Whether the regime is prepared to alter its long-term nuclear strategy is still an open question. In nuclear policy, the Iranian leadership is facing its toughest dilemma in more than 20 years. On one hand, there is a strong desire to develop an arsenal of nuclear weapons as a national deterrent: Iran is located in a rough neighborhood that includes at least five states with nuclear weapons. On the other hand, pursuing a nuclear program will isolate Iran, lead to new sanctions, and give the United States a pretext not only to destroy Iran's nuclear centers, but even to use a mixture of military and political pressure to topple the regime itself.

That fear is well grounded: Reports suggest that covert action could be used against Iran's nuclear installations. The U.S. has already recruited a number of Mujahedin Khalq elements in Iraq and won a pledge from their leader, Massoud Rajavi, to help with sabotage attacks inside Iran if necessary. If the U.S. and/or Israel were to strike areas in Iran, Tehran would be unable to retaliate except through Lebanese and Palestinian radical groups. The regime would appear weak and vulnerable, thus encouraging domestic opponents who dream of its overthrow.

Imagined as the ultimate weapon to ensure the safety of the mullahs' regime, Tehran's nuclear program is fast developing into a serious threat to the Islamic Republic itself.

Mr. Taheri is an Iranian author of ten books on the Middle East and Islam. He was executive editor of Kayhan, Iran's main daily newspaper, from 1972 to 1979

Email Benador Associates: eb@benadorassociates.com

http://www.benadorassociates.com/article/644

Open Letter to Massoud Rajavi
22 June 2003

Open letter to Mr Massoud Rajavi

Mr Rajavi,

For some time now your number hasn’t come up in the lottery. And it has been stated time and time again that this is not because of the strength of the Iranian regime nor because of international deals, rather it is because you have been heaping sh!t onto your own head for all these years and now even you can smell it on yourself. Now what you have done with your own hand cannot be undone.

On the 15 June 2003 you suddenly issued three statements under your NCRI pseudonym crying wolf, saying ‘help, help Jamil Bassam and Ebrahim Khodabandeh have been handed over to Iran by the Syrian authorities. Shock, horror.’ But, by the way, you didn’t say why they were in Syria. You didn’t state from what date it has not been a crime for the Mojahedin to see their families. You didn’t say which donkey from your intelligence stable chose Syria for families to meet. You didn’t say that, following your orders, Ebrahim didn’t see his English daughter and grandchildren in the UK more than six or seven times in all their lives. Nor did you say that for twenty-five years Ebrahim didn’t see his mother more than once or that Jamil had not seen his mother at all for two decades. And you have not said a thousand other things which have since surfaced in the past few days.

In truth, Mr Rajavi, instead of giving the scheduled time of flights from Syria to Iran, was it not better to explain in your statement why you had sent Jamil and Ebrahim to Syria in the first place. Wasn’t it better that, instead of giving the serial numbers of their travel documents, you said what documents they were carrying and for what offence they were arrested. And wasn’t it better, rather than stressing that they were arrested on 18 April and had been in a Syrian prison until now, that you explained what it was that you and your organisation were hiding for the two months that you were suffocated and couldn’t speak to any international agency of these arrests. Why was it that Amnesty International, the UNHCR and the families of these two people and other agencies which could have been of help were given the news by the National Council of Resistance of Iran only two months after the arrest and exactly on the day that you had made certain that they were now in Iran.

Really Mr Rajavi, when, in the middle of the night of 15 June, Ms Mehrafruz Paykarnegar, one your devotees, called from the Paris office of your Council to the daughter of Ebrahim, who had only given birth to her new baby four weeks earlier, and told her “your father was taken to Iran yesterday and they are going to execute him tomorrow, come to London for a demonstration in front of the Syrian embassy tomorrow morning”, did you not think that she might need a few words of explanation? The next day when you sent Ms Mitra Baqeri from London to convince her to participate in your press conference, even in her post-natal condition, didn’t you think that saying sentences like “how come you can sit in your comfortable house while your father is lying on the torture bed”, would make the distressing situation that you have already created for her even worse.

Or maybe this actually is your aim, and one of your tactics is to unbalance people in this way in order to use them as you wish, otherwise you wouldn’t at the same time send a telephone message from one of your rats houses in London under the name of Mahmoud (which telephone number is already known and the identity of the person is under investigation) telling her “if it was my father I would burn myself in front of parliament right now”. Didn’t you think that when the mother of Ebrahim’s daughter refused to participate in your meetings and you brought Ms Elahe Azimfar to sit in the press conference to pose as Ebrahim’s wife that it would have been better if you had explained a little bit about the forced separation and divorces in the Mojahedin in the last twenty years on your direct order which has stopped any marriage and created a gender apartheid in the organisation. And after all, didn’t you think that all these lies and cheap deception would not last for more than just a few days.

Really Mr Rajavi, with all those MPs and lawyers on whom, as Mitra Baqeri stressed, you spent tens of thousands of pounds in order to have the Syrians release Jamil and Ebrahim, couldn’t you, together with the rest of the geniuses surrounding you, come to the conclusion that they would have to do something before their extradition to Iran and not after? And really, if you had involved only a little bit of intelligence, do you think anybody would accept that you believed these two people to be anything but expendable. You know and we know that this wasn’t your first time.

Mr Rajavi, we don’t buy your crocodile tears and those of your infamous backers of yesterday and today. You thought that once again you could fool everyone. You were mistaken. Only a few days have passed and many facts have now been revealed and have been passed to the relevant authorities. Let a few more days pass, and we will expose the rest of your deception and be certain that by whatever means we will add these documents to those already gathered and waiting for your prosecution. The time of hiding behind Saddam Hussein’s facilities is past and you cannot undo what has been done.

When you sent a message to Ebrahim’s daughter to burn herself, and obviously the relevant documents have been passed to the police, the execution of the orders for the following self-immolations had not been carried out. Did you not think that the trace of your organisational order for self-immolation could be discovered in these latest activities. Really Mr Rajavi, wasn’t this part of your programme to perform a propaganda miracle in Europe which was interrupted by the French police with the arrest of your dollies.

Mr Rajavi, we found that after Neda Hassani’s self-immolation in London, your agents told reporters that she had come from Canada to England on holiday. Didn’t you think that her picture and interview aboard a tank in Ashraf camp in Cosmopolitan magazine (May 1999) might tell a different story? Or maybe you still want to emphasise that this is as true as the story of Jamil and Ebrahim meeting their families in Syria both at the same time? When Azam Leila Jazayeri nee Mullahzahe who for the benefit of parliamentarians in the UK has, for the past twenty years, been blaming the death of her husband Hassan Jazayeri, who actually died in your manoeuvre grounds in Iraq, on the Iranian regime, and who is also a well known character to the police in the UK, was presented to the media as a bystander, did you expect that nobody would say anything? Why? Mr Rajavi, it doesn’t take a genius to see your dirty hands and training behind each and every recent self-immolation. You are not the first leader of a cult in the world, nor are these tactics and brainwashing unknown or unfathomable. Self-immolation as an indicator of paralysis of thought can only be performed by people who have been drowned in some cult or other, not by a political sympathiser or a Canadian tourist.

How do you think we should remember Marzieh Babakhani or the others who you have bred for slaughter? In the end they weren’t killed by the regime ruling Iran, you killed them. Really Mr Rajavi, what happened that the fate of Jamil and Ebrahim under the knife of their thirty year old enemy is being analysed as being a far better one than the fate of Marzieh Babakhani and those others like her, who burned in the fire of your lust for power. And really, is it true that this is a process to replace the use of Abu Ghraib prison after the downfall of your friend Saddam? Mr Rajavi, whatever action is being undertaken in Europe and America to save the lives of Jamil and Ebrahim is not being done to rescue two unfortunates who were sacrificed due to the lack of sense in your system, but two who were expended deliberately by you for your own benefit so that you could run away. Whether they are rescued or not, the responsibility for them before the British government, before Human Rights organisations and before humanity is on your shoulders and that of your gang of bandits.

Following this and as soon as the solicitor has confirmed them as evidence, the details in the documents will be published.

Iran-Interlink
22 June 2003

copies to:
Office of the Prime Minister, the Rt Hon, Tony Blair MP, UK
Foreign and Commonwealth Office, UK
Home Office, UK
Office of Secretary of State Colin Powell, USA
Office of Secretary of Defence Donald Rumsfeld, USA
Kofi Annan, Secretary General of the United Nations
Amnesty International
UNHCR
Prosecuting Offices in the UK, France, Belgium Norway and Germany
Embassies of countries in the UK
Interested MPs in the European Parliament, the UK and the US Senate

Article from 7-7-03 Nat'l Review

The Anti-Mullah MUJAHEDEEN
Iraq’s Iranian opposition.

By Hussain Hindawi & John R. Thomson (7-7-03)

It's difficult to imagine a more indigestible aspect of the Middle Eastern maelstrom than one country's armed opposition hosted by its neighbor. But there is: when the reverse situation simultaneously applies; that is, when the armed opposition to the first host government is succored and supported by the neighbor.

Such is the case between Iran and Iraq. As Iran faces a widely popular revolution stimulated by its restive youth, and Iraq struggles to regain its civil footing, the situation threatens to further destabilize two already tottering societies.

Iran's nurturing of the Supreme Council for the Islamic Revolution in Iraq (SCIRI) and its leader Ayatollah Mohammed Bakr al-Hakim has been anything but a one-way terror transaction. For the past 17 years, the most powerful opposition group to the mullahs, the Mujahedeen-e-Khalq, has been parked across the border in eastern Iraq.

The collapse of Saddam Hussein's regime removed the protected position of the Mujahedeen (a different set of guerrillas from the mostly Arab mujahedeen in Afghanistan) and has correspondingly ushered in new variables in the Iranian power struggle. What follows promises to be a bitter contest among the entrenched clerics of the Islamic Republic, the armed Mujahedeen opposition and the overwhelming majority of Iranians, led by their youth and encouraged by the United States.

America must weigh new strategic options vis-à-vis Iran, concerning its commitment to prevent establishment of an Islamist state in Iraq as well as reform or replacement of Tehran's terror-prone, autocratic ayatollahs. Some argue that America's democratic objectives would be furthered by allowing an Iranian opposition led by Massoud Rajavi, head of Mujahedeen-e-Khalq (literally, "The People's Struggle"), to play a role similar to the exiled Iraqi opposition, brought together under the umbrella of the "Iraqi National Congress." Whereas the INC had some claim to diversified legitimacy, the Mujahedeen's purported allied groups are mostly made up of paper organizations established by Massoud Rajavi, with titles but few players.

At the start of the invasion of Iraq, American forces had warned Mujahedeen-e-Khalq to disarm or be attacked. However, the ultimatum was withdrawn postwar, with announcement of a ceasefire that included the members of the group giving up their weapons, mostly supplied by Saddam Hussein, as well as their checkpoints (read, shakedown stations), in return for the Coalition allowing the Mujahedeen to remain temporarily in Iraq. The rebel group insisted it had reached "agreement, and not surrender" with the American forces, falsely implying an understanding of mutual interests between the two parties.

Massoud Rajavi's next objective: to persuade the U.S. State Department and the European Union to remove the undoubtedly terror-based group's name from their lists of terrorist organizations, a designation it richly deserves.

Founded in 1965 as a Marxist doctrinaire group with a Shiite religious veneer to gain support, Mujahedeen-e-Khalq participated in the 1979 overthrow of the shah of Iran. The group was subsequently expelled from the country, following bloody confrontations with the new government's forces that left thousands of Mujahedeen killed. The organization continued to confront the mullahs in Tehran, carrying out armed attacks and assassinations inside Iran at the height of Saddam's eight-year war with Iran, from bases in neighboring Iraq. These increased after the first election of Mohammad Khatami as president in 1997, but have reduced greatly in recent months.

Rajavi formed the Iranian Liberation Popular Army, which numbered perhaps 5-8,000 (vs. the publicly claimed 15,000) fighters, perhaps a third of them women. Most of its weaponry, including Soviet-made M-8 helicopters, tanks and mortar launchers, was handed over by the Iraqi army, which had seized it from Iranian forces during the 1980-88 war.

The government in Tehran has asked countries to hand over Mujahedeen-e-Khalq leaders for trial, promising to grant non-leadership cadres amnesty. Tehran has recently claimed the surrender of hundreds of Mujahedeen, but the group's spokesman has denied it.

Variously reported to be in France, Russia, or Jordan, Massoud Rajavi's precise whereabouts are kept purposely unclear, evidently owing to fears of Iraqi hostility towards him and his organization. Iraqis have long accused the Mujahedeen of participating with Saddam's Republican Guard in suppressing the Shia and Kurd uprisings in 1991, which Rajavi has denied but is undoubtedly accurate.

In an unusual move designed to broaden its weak base of support, one of several front groups controlled by Rajavi, the so-called National Council of Resistance in Iran designated his wife Maryam, president-elect of Iran in 1993. The resolution called for the longtime anti-shah and anti-mullah activist to be installed immediately following the overthrow of the current regime. (Rajavi had ordered Maryam's first husband, Mehdi Abrishamchi, to divorce her in 1987, to make way for what would be Massoud's third marriage "for the sake of the cultural revolution." Forced divorces, forced removal of children from their families, and old-fashioned brain washing are hallmarks of Rajavi's would be Stalinist operation.)

Recently arrested with 150 followers in Paris, Tehran contacts report Maryam Rajavi has as little domestic popular backing as the charismatic, corrupted Massoud. (Paradoxically, the French police action against Mujahedeen-e-Khalq had the double effect of mollifying the mullahs in Tehran and the Bush administration. This action coincided with a general move by Europe to re-align more closely with U.S. policy, very much unlike the Quai d'Orsay's sharply worded admonition to Italy's Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi to court the Palestinians' corrupted president, Yasser Arafat, and not Prime Minister Mahmoud Abbas.)

Because of its cooperation with Iraq during the 1980-88 war and ongoing support for Saddam Hussein's hated regime — including the murder of thousands of fellow Shiite rebels — the entire Mujahedeen-e-Khalq movement has minimal strength in Iran. The Mujahedeen are particularly weak with dissident 20- and 30-somethings across the land, critical to any group's success with 60 percent of Iranians under the age of 25.

Nevertheless, in the Byzantine bypaths of Middle Eastern politics, Massoud, Maryam, and their Mujahedeen mates continue to fight twin battles: overthrow the regime in Tehran and gain recognition of Mujahedeen-e-Khalq as legitimate leaders of the opposition. To win either contest, they must first convince their countrymen that their newly professed belief in democracy is genuine. And that appears very unlikely, indeed.

— Hussain Hindawi is a native Iraqi historian, humanitarian, and journalist who currently serves as editor of United Press International's Arabic News Service. John R. Thomson has been involved in the Middle East since 1966 as businessman, diplomat, and journalist. This was written for UPI and is reprinted with permission.

http://www.nationalreview.com/comment/comment-hindawi-thomson070703.asp

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