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U.N., Red Cross Set $73 Million Appeal for Iran Quake

January 08, 2004
Reuters
Yahoo News

UNITED NATIONS -- The United Nations and the Red Cross on Thursday launched a $73 million appeal for victims of the earthquake that razed the Iranian city of Bam, killing some 30,000 people.

U.N. agencies are trying to raise .3 million and the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies is hoping for $42 million.

The money will be used over the next three months to provide medical care, revive agricultural production, restore water and sanitation services, and educate children, among other efforts, U.N. humanitarian coordinator Jan Egeland said.

The Dec. 26 earthquake, which measured 6.8 on the Richter scale, destroyed 90 percent of the city's buildings, including hospitals and schools. Egeland went to Bam for the appeal and issued a statement in his New York office.

The United Nations said earlier this week it had raised nearly $74 million in aid for the earthquake victims but needs more funds or goods in kind.

http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&u=/nm/20040108/pl_nm/quake_iran_un_dc_1

Iran Sent Arms to Hizbullah on Aid Planes

January 08, 2004
The Jerusalem Post
Arieh O'Sullivan

Taking advantage of the massive airlift of humanitarian aid to earthquake victims in Iran, Syria has reportedly allowed Teheran to resume their supplies of weapons to Hizbullah through Damascus.

According to Channel 1, cargo planes filled with weapons began landing in the Syrian capital last week brimming with weapons for the Iranian-backed Hizbullah organization. It was the first time since the Syrians halted the weapons flow under American pressure prior to the invasion of Iraq a year ago.

Sources in the Defense Ministry confirmed the reports, calling it a "cynical manipulation of humanitarian aid". They said that there has always been a trickling of weapons and propaganda to the Hizbullah but that the weapons transferred recently were larger quantities than in the past.

Until then the Iranians had delivered weapons to Hizbullah through weekly flights into Damascus.

Following the deadly earthquake in the Iranian city of Bam and the subsequent worldwide airlift, the Syrians reportedly dispatched a number of cargo planes to Iran under the guise of humanitarian aid.

The planes were filled with weapons and returned to Syria, Channel 1 reported. The weapons were then loaded on to trucks and ferried to the Hizbullah. The information was relayed to the Americans, the TV reported.

Two weeks ago, a senior IDF officer revealed that Hizbullah was slowly stepping up actions on the northern border, including laying bombs near the border fence. On Thursday, army sappers detonated a string of powerful bombs near the village of Zarit.

The senior officer, speaking on condition of anonymity, said that they had evidence that Iranian Revolutionary Guards were training Hizbullah guerrillas and were also delivering supplies via Syria.

In early December, an Iranian minister visited the Hizbullah position immediately opposite the IDF outpost at Tziporen near Kibbutz Manara.

IDF film crews photographed the minister as he was shown the border and looked into Israel.

http://www.jpost.com/servlet/Satellite?pagename=JPost/JPArticle/ShowFull&cid=1073535533476&p=1008596981749

PRO-REPUBLICAN IRANIANS MEET IN BERLIN

By an IPS Correspondent

BERLIN, 8 Jan. (IPS)

More than five hundreds political activists took part at the first session of the largest ever meeting of Iranian republicans that started Thursday in the German capital of Berlin.

Aimed at giving the dispersed and often antagonistic Iranians supporting parliamentary democracy for Iran, the three days meeting brought together several veteran Iranian political dinosaurs like Mehdi Khanbaba Tehrani, one of the leaders of a former Maoist group, Babak Amirkhosravi, the leader of the banned Iranian Tudeh (Communist Party), Manoochehr Sabetian, a founder of now defunct Confederation of Iranian Students and Rahmat Khosravi, having one point in common: Their staunch opposition to Monarchy, particularly the deposed Pahlavi dynasty.

In a manifesto to be approved by the Berlin meeting, the participants calls for a secular, parliamentary republic for Iran open to all nations without distinction.

According to one of the organizers, it took them more than one year to prepare this meeting, bringing to Berlin pro-republic Iranian dispersed all over the United States and Europe, as well as some representatives from Iran itself.

Observers said while some points of the manifesto, like the clause that calls for secularism can not be endorsed openly by the delegates who came from Tehran, the staunch anti-monarchist point not only alienates many Iranians who support a constitutional monarchy, but shows the republicans undemocratic attitude.

"Rejecting out hand the monarchists do not augur well for the Berlin meeting", observed Mr. Dariush Homayoon, the leader of the largest pro-monarchy movement based in Switzerland.

However, he wished success to the conference and stressed that it is necessary that the Iranian pro-republic movement speak with one single voice and put an end to its endless bickering, as the monarchists did, by rejecting the ultras from their rank.

"Though most of the participants belong to leftist and secular groups, but it is interesting that for the first time representatives of the Iranian National Front and Nationalist-religious movements are also present", noted Mr. Dariush Homa’i, a correspondent for the Persian service of the BBC covering the meeting.

ENDS REPUBLICANS MEETING 8104

http://www.iran-press-service.com/articles_2004/Jan_04/iranian_republicans_meet_8104.htm

Thank you both very much for showing your love. We Iranians really love you and your country. I wish you could post this great sentences to the Iran's thread that all people can read that there. Thanks again! Per request above, as posted in Iran Quakes: Devestation, despair ? and a touch of hope. , to a picture of an Iranian man giving roses to an American rescue worker:

"{LibreOuMort here:] I have been following this thread and reading posts not knowing what to write until I saw this picture! My memories of our short stay in Iran came flooding back. How I miss the beautiful Persian people! I remember being invited to visit private rose gardens, gardens never seen by the public - what indescribable beauty and peace! The mixture of fragrances and colours, the birds singing, the water flowing - it was like another world. I guess you could call it a piece of Heaven. For those of you who may not be aware, the Persians have a unique relationship with roses - they collect them, they breed them, they care for them like a treasure. The gift of a rose is more than a mere expression of gratitude. This is the most precious gift they can give. For some it may be the only gift they can give to show their love. I am NOT exaggerating - they love us. This is no surprise to me. I was the recipient of their love and I have never forgotten them."