Iranian Alert - May 19, 2005 - Iran Won't Give Up Nuke Program, will endure U.N. economic sanctions

Regime Change Iran ^ | 5.19.2005 | DoctorZin

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Top News Story

Official: Iran won't give up nuke program

Excerpt:

By Ali Akbar Dareini, Associated Press Writer

TEHRAN, Iran — Iran will endure U.N. economic sanctions rather than give up nuclear fuel development, the vice president said Wednesday ahead of a new round of meetings with European countries trying to rein in its nuclear program.

Iran is vowing to restart its uranium reprocessing activities, an early stage in preparing raw uranium for either power reactor fuel or a nuclear weapon. At the same time, it has agreed to meet with European countries for one last discussion on the issue next month.

Washington believes Iran is secretly developing nuclear weapons under cover of a peaceful nuclear program. Iran denies this, saying its nuclear program is geared merely toward generating electricity, not bomb. The European Union has threatened to take Iran to the U.N. Security Council for possible sanctions if it resumes nuclear fuel development.

"We don't want to be subject to sanctions. We don't want to go to the U.N. Security Council," Vice President Gholamreza Aghazadeh told state-run television. "But if it happens, our leaders and our people will resist as necessary. They will pay the price of sanctions, but I don't believe they will give up these activities."

A Daily Briefing of Major News Stories on Iran:

• LittleGreenFootballs published MemriTV's: Iranian Television Blood Libel.
• Iran va Jahan says "Mullah Rafsanjani is the living personification of Hutzpah!"
• The New York Times report that Rafsanjani said he wanted to repair relations with the United States. But the U.S. has to do the repairing.
• The Washington Institute for Near East Policy reports on "Nuclear Dangers in the Middle East: Threats and Responses."
• The Jerusalem Post reports that Israeli FM urges Germany to move Iranian issue to the UN.
• Washington Times reports on Hooshang Amirahmadi. Hooshang is a U.S. citizen, president of the American Iranian Council, and now a Iranian presidential candidate. Iranian opposition groups claim "the AIC has been accommodating the Iranian theocracy."
• Islamic Republic News Agency reports Kharrazi said, "Iran ready to share experience on democracy with Iraq."
• Newsweek reports that the MEK hurts its dissident members.
• Iranian Student News Agency published photos of an Iranian student protest.
• Anjomane Padeshahi launched Operation Thunder One in Brussels, a protest operation designed to shame the European governments support for Iran. I have included an update with photos.
• And finally, Cox and Forkum just released another cartoon: Bibliocide.

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[Paul_Denton]

We need to

The mullahs.

[F14 Pilot]

BUMP FOR A FREE IRAN !

[nuconvert]

Excellent official statement by State Dept on their website

http://usinfo.state.gov/usinfo/Archive/2005/May/19-702508.html

(excerpt)

IRAN'S DEMOCRACY AND HUMAN RIGHTS RECORD

 

Iran is a great country with a unique history and culture. The Iranian people have made extraordinary contributions in many fields for thousands of years. Modern Iran will undoubtedly remain a significant country in the future of the broader Middle East.

 

The United States believes the future of Iran should be democratic and pluralistic. We support those who wish to see Iran transformed from a rigid, intolerant theocracy to a modern state. A peaceful, democratic Iran would be a key feature in a reformed, more democratic Middle East. We believe Iran is a country in the process of change. Some two-thirds of its people are below the age of thirty-five. Many young Iranians support the need for a more positive relationship with the U.S. In fact, the U.S. may have a more positive public image in Iran than in other countries of the region. We sense that the sentiment among ordinary Iranians for change for reform and democracy is strong. But that sentiment is ignored by the ruling clique.

 

Iran suffers from a deficit of freedom. The regime's human rights record remains abysmal and the government continues to commit numerous, serious abuses, including summary executions, disappearances, torture and other inhumane treatment. In the late 1990s, elements of Iran's secret services murdered a number of intellectuals and oppositionists. In 2000, a courageous journalist named Akbar Ganji was imprisoned for uncovering the truth and reporting it in his newspaper. Since Ganji was imprisoned, many journalists and even webloggers have been taken into prison where they have been abused and threatened. The Iranian government's actions have essentially eliminated the free press in Iran. In 2003, an Iranian Canadian photojournalist, Zahra Kazemi, was beaten to death in detention. The investigation and trial have been a farce and the Canadian government has taken steps to scale back its relations with Iran.

 

During student protests in June 2003, 4,000 demonstrators were arrested; a few are still held. In December 2003, Parliamentarian Mohsen Mirdamadi was beaten by vigilantes as he started a speech in Yazd. Before the 2004 elections, when reformist members of parliament signed a petition to the Supreme leader asking for more democracy, they were threatened with arrest and arbitrarily stripped of their parliamentary immunity.

 

In fall 2004, for a second year in a row, the United States co-sponsored and actively supported a Canadian resolution at the UN General Assembly condemning the human rights situation in Iran. The Iran human rights resolution passed in the UN General Assembly's 59th Plenary, sending an important signal to the Iranian people that the international community recognized their suffering and to the Iranian Government that dialogue on human rights was no substitute for concrete action to improve its record, and that the serious concern about Iran's overall international behavior would not blunt the international community's focus on the internal human rights situation.

 

On the surface, the Iranian government points to a picture of an active democracy in which Iranians participate regularly in national and local elections. But this is a veneer behind which lies a perverted process whose integrity is severely compromised by the oppressive oversight exercised by hard-line clerical bodies. One of the most egregious recent examples of this extraordinary system was the rigging of the February 2004 Majles elections, in which the Guardian Council disqualified thousands of reformist candidates, including more than 85 sitting members of the Majles. We commend the bravery and dedication of the many ordinary Iranians who put their livelihoods at risk to advance the principles of democracy, religious tolerance, and the accountability of the government to its own people.

 

We are similarly very concerned that the upcoming June 17 Presidential elections will represent another setback for the democratic hopes of the Iranian people. Candidate registration started Tuesday, May 10 in Iran and ended May 15. At the end of the registration period, the names of the Presidential candidates will be forwarded to the 12-member Guardian Council, which then has up to 10 days to assess the eligibility of the candidates. There is every indication the June election will not result in a meaningful expression of the popular will, because the political process and the media are controlled and manipulated by an unelected few the clerical elite and their associates. These unelected leaders dominate Iran's political system, have the power to intimidate and disqualify candidates, and through the exercise of that power have stymied popular demands for freedom. Of the over 1,000 Iranians who have registered to run in the upcoming elections, the Guardian Council is likely to approve less than a dozen candidates. Indeed, in 2001, only 10 of the 814 registered candidates were allowed to run. The diminished role of women in Iranian political life since the February 2004 Majles elections is another clear indicator of the regime's effectiveness in stymieing free popular will and of its anti-democratic beliefs.

 

In November 2003 at the National Endowment for Democracy, President Bush outlined a forward strategy for freedom in the Middle East. He said that "sixty years of Western nations excusing and accommodating the lack of freedom in the Middle East did nothing to make us safe -- because in the long run, stability cannot be purchased at the expense of liberty." In his 2005 Inaugural Address, the President reiterated America's support for the people of the broader Middle East and North Africa in their fight for freedom. "We will persistently clarify the choice before every ruler in every nation: The moral choice between oppression, which is always wrong, and freedom, which is eternally right." President Bush spoke directly to the Iranian people in his February 2, 2005, State of the Union Address, saying: "As you stand for your own liberty, America stands with you."

 

The freedom deficit and the severe restriction on free expression and fair elections is the first of our concerns with Iranian government policy.

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