Iranian Alert -- DAY 34 -- LIVE THREAD PING LIST

The world media has all but ignored this week's dramatic events in Iran. The regime has masterfully handled the world media. As we reported yesterday, the regime appears to have a new ally in their efforts to silent the media, Cuba.

Several days ago we reported the jamming of LA based Iranian broadcasters, the key link of communication of the Iranian protest movement. The regime had been jamming the signals in the past within Iran using equipment purchased from France.

But days before the July 9th protests were to begin the broadcaster began reporting that their uplink signal was being jammed as well. This would require jamming equipment either in the US or nearby. We have been seeking confirmation of this story. We now have it.

Loral Skynet, hired a firm to investigate the source of the jamming. The result was that they have narrowed the probable source of the jamming to be in the vicinity of Havana Cuba.

This story has national security implications. We need to write the media and ensure they cover this breaking story. We need to contact our elected officials and demand they investigate this immediately.

These efforts by the regime, while successful in the short term, do not resolve the fundamental reasons why this regime is crumbling from within.

Iran is a country ready for a regime change. 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.

Please continue to join us here, post your news stories and comments to this thread.

Could you tell me more about what you thought and what you think about us?

I remember those days too.

As angry as I was about the hostage situation (it was against all norms and laws of diplomacy) I was infuriated at the Iranian students in this country who told lies about being beaten and so forth when they were rounded up and their visas in the US were terminated.

What was strange was that, many Americans at the time were sympathetic to the Iranian revolution (due to the abuses by SAVAK) as we thought this was what the Iranians wanted and we would support them.

The actions of a few students here made it difficult for many Iranians who fled here after the Shah left. Quite honestly, there was a lot of anti-Iranian feeling for some time and it made it difficult for Iranians to be employed here.

Personally, my anger was mitigated by meeting other Iranians who were truly some of the nicest human beings I had ever met.

So I chalked up much of the bad behavior by some stuents in the US to their youth.

I'm glad another generation of Iranians is doing the hard work of striving for freedom and I wish them all the Providence and luck to achieve real democracy in Iran.

-Miami Herald

Posted on Sun, Jul. 13, 2003

Andres Oppenheimer
Cuba, Iran seek global Internet censorship rules

If you are outraged by the fact that Libya has been elected president of the United Nations Human Rights Commission, get this: Cuba and Iran -- among the world's worst dictatorships -- are playing a major role in drafting new U.N.-backed rules on the worldwide use of the Internet.

Not surprisingly, these repressive regimes are proposing rules that, if adopted by an upcoming U.N. Summit on the Information Society, would not only allow but encourage widespread censorship of the Internet, as well as growing state controls of TV and radio stations.

The World Summit on the Information Society, scheduled for December in Geneva, is organized by the U.N. Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO), and the International Telecommunication Union, another U.N. affiliate.

WRITTEN BY CUBA?

UNESCO, you may remember, is the organization whose campaign for a ''New World Information Order'' -- with greater state controls -- led the United States to withdraw from that group 18 years ago. The U.S. government is scheduled to rejoin the organization this year.

When I heard about the proposals to regulate the Internet, I went into the summit's website, www.itu.int/wsis/, and read key portions of the draft declaration that is scheduled to be adopted in December. It contains alarming proposals.

The most terrifying paragraphs are being proposed by Cuba, the country that earlier this year arrested 75 peaceful dissidents -- including 26 independent journalists -- and sentenced them to up to 28 years in prison for ''crimes'' such as possessing a tape recorder, having an unauthorized copying machine, or publishing articles in foreign media.

Cuba's crackdown on journalists led the French human rights group Reporters Without Borders to declare the island as ``the world's biggest prison for members of the press.''

SOME HIGHLIGHTS

Among the Cuban proposals contained in the summit's draft documents, which also include some milder recommendations by Iran:

• That the summit's Declaration of Principles paragraph calling for universal and affordable access to the Internet include the words ''in conformity with domestic legislation of each country.'' In other words, Cuba wants the U.N. document to give an official blessing to its policy of deciding who gets access to the Internet.

• That the document's paragraph about Internet domain names and other oversight rules, which establishes that Internet governance must be ''multilateral, democratic and transparent,'' be changed to include the word ''intergovernmental.'' In other words, that all major decisions on Internet traffic be subject to governments' approval.

• That the summit's action plan include a paragraph stating, ''legal and administrative measures should be taken to prohibit undue concentration of private ownership and control of the media.'' Fine, but who is to judge what constitutes ''undue concentration''? Countries like Cuba, which have total concentration of the media in government hands?

• That another paragraph be added to the action plan, stating that accountability by the global media ''should be enhanced through targeted measures of screening by governments.'' Great! We would have governments that jail journalists for their writings ''screening'' our stories!

U.S. officials and international freedom-of-the-press groups are worried about the December summit. They say there is a real chance that some of this language may actually be adopted.

`REASON FOR CONCERN'

The key issue at the conference will be whether the international community condemns or endorses the ''fire walls'' that many dictatorships are erecting to block access to Internet websites that they consider politically inconvenient, they say.

''Cuba is proposing language that would favor state control of the media,'' U.S. assistant secretary of state for international organizations Kim R. Holmes said in an interview. ``There is reason to be concerned.''

Asked whether the Bush administration is reconsidering the U.S. decision to rejoin UNESCO on Oct. 1, Holmes said that ''it's not something what we are consciously considering at this time.'' Other officials note that, to his credit, UNESCO Director Koishiro Matsuura has criticized Cuba's recent crackdown on independent journalists.

My conclusion: If dictatorships prevail in getting the December summit to approve a greater ''screening by governments'' of the new century's most rapidly growing communication medium, I would see UNESCO as a dangerous advocate of global censorship.

Perhaps what's needed is just the opposite effort: an international alliance of democracies to fight censorship on the Internet. Rep. Christopher Cox, R-Calif., has proposed a bill calling on the U.S. government to ''direct substantial international broadcasting resources to a global effort to defeat Internet jamming and censorship.'' Technically, it can be done, congressional sources say.

I agree. Rather than debating proposals to impose global censorship, the December summit should expose regimes that are still trying to deny their citizens their basic rights to read whatever they want.

State Department Has the Iran Situation All Wrong

July 12, 2003
Knite Ridder Tribune
Joel Mowbray

With turmoil in Iran gaining more and more attention - at least when Liberia isn't taking center stage - the media guessing game about the Persian nation has kicked into high-gear: is Iran next? Of course the question implies military action, but Iran could be "next" - just not in the military sense.

Last Wednesday marked the fourth anniversary of the July 9, 1999, crackdown on peaceful protesters at Tehran University, which immediately triggered more than 15,000 demonstrators to take to the streets. Even though the Iranian regime has recently jailed hundreds of the freedom movement's leaders - and thousands of people in all - as many as 10,000 protesters marked the anniversary in Tehran alone. Iranians demanding freedom and a truly democratic government were met with tear gas and wide-scale arrests.

The international press has labeled the demonstrators "students," but that's quite misleading. Students account for most of the leaders of the peace protests, but the movement has stretched into working-class and upper middle-class neighborhoods alike - and the government is as unpopular as any since the fall of the shah in 1979. The protesters want what many Americans take for granted: freedom.

Iran is a country with a rich cultural heritage. The population is well-educated, and the 70 percent of the country under the age of 25 is largely secular. Unlike most Middle Eastern countries where Islamic fundamentalism has a certain appeal because it has never taken the reins of power, Iran is a nation whose citizens have had more than 20 years to develop their disdain for fundamentalist rule. They are hungry for a homeland that looks more like America.

Too bad the U.S. State Department hasn't been helping them reach that goal.

To listen to the diplomats at Foggy Bottom, Iran is a country divided between the religious "hardliners" and the moderate "reformers." State's No. 2 official actually called Iran a "democracy" in an interview with the Los Angeles Times this February. Give the ruling mullahs credit for this much - they managed to dupe the U.S. State Department.

The Iranian mullahs pulled off an impressive marketing job by holding two consecutive elections in which a "reformer" won the presidency and then allowing the "reformers" to win a majority of parliament in the 2000 election. Beneath the surface, though, the story is much different. The Council of Guardians, a panel of 12 mullahs that controls most of Iran, vetted all candidates for president and Parliament. Even if the "reformers" who control the Parliament are actual reformers, they have little power to change anything. The Council of Guardians can veto any bill it chooses.

But the greatest - and most dangerous - myth that the mullahs have managed to perpetuate is that President Mohammad Khatami is a "reformer." What most don't realize is that he spent a decade as Iran's chief censor, from 1982 to 1992, where he censored more than 600 publications. He was one of 238 people who placed their hats in the ring - and 234 were declared ineligible by the Council of Guardians. In other words, Khatami was only of four candidates deemed acceptable by the mullahs.

Even though the elections were hardly more democratic than those found in the old Soviet Union, Iran's attempts to dress them up as something more apparently have worked. Secretary of State Colin Powell earlier this month called President Khatami "freely elected." But the harm caused by Powell's department runs much deeper than mere rhetoric.

For several years now, State has been trying to "engage" the mullahs. That approach has yielded little; the mullahs are still brutally repressing the Iranian people, and their efforts to develop nukes have not even slowed. The alternative approach isn't a military one, though. State could truly support the protesters - as President Bush has repeatedly done - and it could refuse to legitimize a crumbling regime with more "talks."

These steps wouldn't be a panacea - but they would be a crucial place to start.

http://iranvajahan.net/cgi-bin/news_en.pl?l=en&y=2003&m=07&d=13&a=5

"If you want on or off this Iran ping list, Freepmail me”

Three more journalists held in Iran: Report
AFP
Tehran, July 13

Three more Iranian journalists have been arrested, taking the total currently behind bars to 21, the student ISNA news agency reported.

Hossein Bastani and Vahid Ostad-Pour of the pro-reform Yas-e-No daily, and Shahram Mohammadi-Nia, director of the weekly Vaght (Time), were summoned on Saturday by Tehran prosecutor, Saeed Mortazavi and then arrested, a Yas-e-No colleague told ISNA.

Bastani is famed for his political commentaries against the conservatives in Yas-e-No, the mouthpiece of the Islamic Iran Particiapation Front (IIPF), Iran's main reformist party led by Mohammad-Reza Khatami, brother of President Mohammad Khatami.

He is also a government employee charged with preparing news bulletins for President Khatami's office, press reports said.

Mohammadi-Nia has been accused of publishing an "inappropriate photograph and article," ISNA said, adding that "he was sent to jail since he could not post bail of 100 million rials" (more than $12,000).

Iraj Jamshidi, chief editor of the Asia financial daily which was suspended on Monday for publishing a front page picture of banned opposition leader Maryam Rajavi, remains in jail despite posting the required bail of two billion rials ($245,000), his paper said.

Yas-e-No reported that his brother Esmaiel Jahmshidi, a member of Iran's Writers Association, was also arrested on Wednesday.

I remember those days too.
... What was strange was that, many Americans at the time were sympathetic to the Iranian revolution (due to the abuses by SAVAK) as we thought this was what the Iranians wanted and we would support them.
...Quite honestly, there was a lot of anti-Iranian feeling for some time and it made it difficult for Iranians to be employed here.
Personally, my anger was mitigated by meeting other Iranians who were truly some of the nicest human beings I had ever met.

This is almost exactly my experience. My wife had lived in Tehran and loved it and the people. When we met (in college) she was hanging out with the Iranian crowd. Then is when I began to get an education about Iran and Iranians.

I'm glad another generation of Iranians is doing the hard work of striving for freedom and I wish them all the Providence and luck to achieve real democracy in Iran.

As do I.

Iranian-Canadian photographer likely to be buried in Iran
2 hours, 2 minutes ago

MONTREAL (AFP) - The mother of an Iranian-Canadian photojournalist, whose suspicious death was confirmed by Iranian authorities, has granted permission for her daughter to be buried in Iran, Canada's Ministry of Foreign Affairs said Sunday.

The mother of Zahra Kazemi, who lives in Iran, "has signed documents authorising the burial from today," a spokesman for the ministry here, Reynald Doiron, told AFP.

The announcement comes one day after the dead photojournalist's son, Stephan Hachemi, called for the repatriation of his mother's body to Canada.

Hachemi is seeking clarification on how his mother died.

"We are requesting that the Iranian authorities repatriate the body, in order to assist her son, but if the family have a change of heart, our request would be withdrawn," Doiron said.

"According to the laws of the Koran, a mother has the over-riding say in what happens to a body," he explained.

Kazemi, 54, died in uncertain circumstances after she was arrested by the Iranian authorities in late June for taking photographs of protestors outside the Evin prison in northern Tehran.

Iran's reformist President Mohammad Khatami (news - web sites) has told government ministers to investigate the matter and has expressed regrets over Kazemi's death.

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