Iranian Alert -- August 1, 2003 -- LIVE THREAD PING LIST

It will sooner or later. As the financial and socal crisis in Iran deepens the present regime is running towards the abyss.

I am prepared to pay off the present crooks, as this will be less costly for the Iranian people, but it seems that there will be a revolution.

This is a remarkable piece--Please everyone email it or post it on other chat sites------

I don't think the U.S. would send low level personnel to talk about 2 very important subjects.

The meeting was part of a series of regular meetings with Iranians. I agree that the secretary not attended, but I would not say that it was a low lever meeting.

I can not spell, lever => level, time to go home.

Sounds like it from their description.

Different parts of the Iranian government (incl the clerics etc) have talks with the US, and in many cases they do not tell the other branches of the Iranian government of these meetings. Rafsanjani does this very often. This is very confusing.

I don't know what that has to do with anything.

I go back to my original statement:

"I think the students are overreacting on this point."

The U.S. is NOT going to make a deal with Rafsanjani and back him in 2005. Period. And that's the message the students need to get.

Thanks for filling in the details...

Radio Farda - Summary of Iran Stories in Today's Broadcasts

August 01, 2003
Radio Farda
Behnam Nateghi

US Denies Talking to Iran on Exchange of Prisoners

- The US on Thursday denied a report that talks it was talking to Iran an on a possible exchange of senior al Qaeda members in Iran for U.S.-held members of an anti-regime terror group Mojahedin-e Khalq Organization (MKO). The US has "communicated to Iran the importance of turning over senior members of al Qaeda," a senior Bush administration official said. “No quid pro quo, no negotiations, no exchange.” (Ardavan Niknam)

Reporter Calls on Khatami to Probe Torture of Fellow Tabrizi Journalist

- In a letter to President Mohammad Khatami, Tabriz-based journalist Payman Pakmehr asked him to investigate the recent arrest and torture of independent Tabriz journalist Ensafali Hedayat, a frequent interviewee on Radio Farda, who was arrested in the wake of the recent pro-democracy protests in Iran. In an earlier letter to Mr. Khatami, Hedayat reported being severely beaten and threatened to death by police and plain-clothes security officials while in his 28-day custody. Pakmehr himself was arrested and beaten after giving a report to Radio Farda about a gathering of people in praise of an ancient Iranian anti-Islam figure near Tabriz. (Bahman Bastani)

Regime Closes Islamic Student Councils

- The Islamic government began closing Islamic student councils in universities, making further activities of their members illegal. In an open letter, the Islamic student council of the Sahand University in Tabriz, which has recently been closed by the judiciary, termed the move “an effort by the conservatives to impose a graveyard-like silence on the universities”. (Bahman Bastani)

Journalists Back Reformist MP's Attack on Hard-line Prosecutor

- In an open letter, a number of journalist expressed support for reformist MP Mohsen Armin's recent call for the ousting of Tehran prosecutor Saeed Mortazavi. Faramarz Qarabaghi, who has signed the open letter, tells Radio Farda that Judge Mortazavi is a key figure in the ever-increasing pressure on journalists. “Mr. Armin for the first time explicitly pointed Mortazavi and other judiciary elements who suppress freedom of expression,” Qarabaghi said. (Kayvan Hosseini)

Iranians in Toronto Call for Investigation of Kazemi's Death

- Toronto-based Center for Thought, Dialogue and Human Rights in Iran held a gathering on Thursday to protest the death of Canadian-Iranian journalist Zahra Kazemi, who died in custody of head injuries she suffered during interrogation. The Center asked the Canadian government to press Iran for further investigation. (Maryam Aqvami, Toronto)

Canada Plans to Sponsor UN Resolution to Condemn Iran's Human Rights Vilations

- Zahara Kazemi's death has spoiled Iran's innocuously good relations with Canada. In private, the Canadians talk about sponsoring a UN resolution to condemn Iran's human-rights record, something that Iranians, of all stripes, are keen to prevent, writes London weekly the Economist.

MESA Asks for Release of Students

- In a letter to the Supreme Leader, the Middle East Studies Association of North America (MESA) condemned attacks on and mass arrests of university students in Iran. MESA called on the Supreme Leader to ensure that that the imprisoned students and political activists are released immediately, and that all those guilty of violent attacks on student be identified and punished according to law. MESA accused the Supreme Leader of direct involvement in suppression of dissent. (Golnaz Esfandiari)

Two Men Sentenced to Death for Murder of 9 Women

- A court in central town Arak sentenced to death two young men for murdering nine women in one year. Police said the convicts' motive was robbery, but the coroner reported that the victims had been raped. (Kayvan Hosseini)

International Human Rights Advocates Condemn Arrests of Students, Journalists

- In two separate statements published on Thursday, Amnesty International expressed concern over the imprisoned students, as well as members of the religious-nationalist coalition activists. Meanwhile, the Paris-based Reporters Sans Borders voiced concern about the imprisonment of 21 journalists in very harsh conditions in Iran, calling the Islamic Republic “the biggest prison for journalists in the Middle East”. (Golnaz Esfandiari)

- Reporters Sans Frontiers issued a statement expressing concern about the arrest of two Iranian government employees by coalition forces in southern Iraq for security violations on July 2. Foreign ministry spokesman Hamid-Reza Asefi said on Tuesday that the two were “documentary filmmakers,” who worked for the state radio-TV monopoly. A coalition forces spokesman said in Baghdad Wednesday that the activities of Said Abutaleb and Soheil Karimi did not match their claim. (Siavash Ardalan)

US Should Punish Countries that Deal with Iran, Says Economist

- The Economist weekly said in a commentary that the United States, which already stops its own companies from doing business with Iran, could choose to punish other countries that put money into Iranian oil or gas. (Shahran Tabari, London)

Russia Sells Non-Alcoholic Beer to Iran

- With the approval of the Tehran municipal government, Russia's Baltika brewery this week sent its first shipment to Iran -- 30,000 liters of non-alcoholic version of Baltika, Russia's most popular beer. (Mani Kasravi, Moscow)

http://www.radiofarda.com/transcripts/topstory/2003/08/20030801_2230_0039_0418_EN.asp

Radio Farda - Summary of Iran Stories in Today's Broadcasts

August 01, 2003
Radio Farda
Behnam Nateghi

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/956243/posts?page=50#50

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

Iranian Justice, They Murder Journalists

July 31, 2003
The Economist
The Economist Print Edition

The plan backfired. Iran's hardline judiciary chief tried to get the better of his opponents by asking Saeed Mortezavi, the Tehran prosecutor who ordered the arrest of Zahra Kazemi, a Canadian-Iranian journalist, to investigate her subsequent death in custody.

But after pressure from President Muhammad Khatami, Ms Kazemi's death is being probed by one of the judiciary's less flagrantly politicised branches. And Mr Mortezavi, the leader of the campaign to gag Iran's reformist press and jail its stars, has been weakened, with conservatives re-examining his usefulness.

It is now undisputed that Ms Kazemi died as a result of violence done to her during her detention, from June 23rd to 26th. Two questions remain. First, which of the agencies that questioned her—the prosecutor's office, the intelligence ministry, or the intelligence branch of the police—landed the fatal blows? Javad Ismaili, the criminal-court judge in charge of the investigation, is spreading his net wide: members of all three agencies are said to have been among the five people whose detention was announced on July 26th.

Second, to what extent should Mr Mortezavi, who has boasted in private of having secured Ms Kazemi's “confession”, carry the can? He has already been named, by a team appointed by Mr Khatami, as one of her interrogators, and a reformist deputy has accused people from his office of beating the journalist. But the most damaging missile was fired by Muhammad-Hossein Khoshvaght, the head of the culture ministry's foreign media department.

On July 23rd Mr Mortezavi blamed Mr Khoshvaght for sowing confusion over the cause of Ms Kazemi's death. The following day, newspapers printed a letter in which Mr Khoshvaght accused the chief prosecutor of pressuring him into announcing that Ms Kazemi had died of a stroke, and of threatening him with prosecution for abetting Ms Kazemi's “espionage”. Mr Khoshvaght also indirectly accused Mr Mortezavi of lying to the public about the case. Unless the prosecutor is conspicuously exonerated, it will be hard for judicial hardliners to repose much faith in him again.

Having banned some 80 publications, and jailed more than a dozen journalists, the youthful Mr Mortezavi may have grown too big for his boots. His alleged enthusiasm for threatening the families of suspects as a means of forcing confessions has become an embarrassment. The most famous of the reformist confessors, Abbas Abdi, recently claimed from his prison cell that it was such pressure that had persuaded him to recant.

Ms Kazemi's death has spoiled Iran's innocuously good relations with Canada. In private, the Canadians talk about sponsoring a UN resolution to condemn Iran's human-rights record, something that Iranians, of all stripes, are keen to prevent.

Nobody expects to see Mr Mortezavi in the defendant's stand. In 1998, in an even grislier tussle between Mr Khatami and the hardliners, a presidential team of investigators forced the intelligence ministry to own up to four gruesome assassinations. In return, the president did not insist that justice be done—the senior conservatives who ordered the killings remain free—only that political murder be abandoned as a tool of domestic policy.

This time, there is unlikely to be a great or sudden improvement in the appalling treatment of journalists, which has earned Iran the distinction, conferred by Reporters Without Borders, of being “the biggest prison for journalists in the Middle East”. But the furore may at least make it harder for journalists to be beaten to death while in custody. That would be another of the barely perceptible advances that have become Mr Khatami's trademark.

http://www.economist.com/displaystory.cfm?story_id=1958053

Iranian Justice, They Murder Journalists

July 31, 2003
The Economist
The Economist Print Edition

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/956243/posts?q=1&&page=52#52

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

Reality hard for left to explain

August 01, 2003

By Charles Krauthammer
WASHINGTON -- Amid the general media and Democratic frenzy over Niger yellowcake, it is Bill Clinton who injected a note of sanity. "What happened, often happens," Clinton told Larry King. "There was a disagreement between British intelligence and American intelligence. The president said it was British intelligence that said it ... British intelligence still maintains that they think the nuclear story was true. I don't know what was true, what was false. I thought the White House did the right thing in just saying, 'Well, we probably shouldn't have said that.'"

Big deal. End of story. End of scandal.

The fact that the Democrats and the media can't seem to let go of it, however, is testimony to their need (and ability) to change the subject. From what? From the moral and strategic realities of Iraq. The moral reality finally burst through the yellowcake fog with the death of the Hussein brothers, psychopathic torturers who would today be running Iraq if not for the policy enunciated by President Bush in that very same State of the Union address.

That moral reality is a little hard for the left to explain, given the fact that it parades as the guardian of human rights and all-around general decency, and rallied millions to try to prevent the very policy that liberated Iraq from Uday and Qusay's reign of terror.

Then there are the strategic realities. Consider what has happened in the Near East since Sept. 11, 2001:

(1) In Afghanistan, the Taliban have been overthrown and a decent government installed.

(2) In Iraq, the Saddam regime has been overthrown, the dynasty destroyed, and the possibility for a civilized form of governance exists for the first time in 30 years.

(3) In Iran, with dictatorships toppled to the east (Afghanistan) and the west (Iraq), popular resistance to the dictatorship of the mullahs has intensified.

(4) In Pakistan, once the sponsor and chief supporter of the Taliban, the government radically reversed course and became a leading American ally in the war on terror.

(5) In Saudi Arabia, where the presence of U.S. troops near the holy cities of Mecca and Medina deeply inflamed relations with many Muslims, the American military is leaving -- not in retreat or with apology, but because it is no longer needed to protect Saudi Arabia from Saddam.

(6) Yemen, totally unhelpful to the United States after the attack on the USS Cole, has started cooperating in the war on terror.

(7) In the small stable Gulf states, new alliances with the United States have been established.

(8) Kuwait's future is secure, the threat from Saddam having been eliminated.

(9) Jordan is secure, no longer having Iraq's tank armies and radical nationalist influence at its back.

(10) Syria has gone quiet, closing terrorist offices in Damascus and downplaying its traditional anti-Americanism.

(11) Lebanon's southern frontier is quiet for the first time in years, as Hezbollah, reading the new strategic situation, has stopped cross-border attacks into Israel.

(12) Israeli-Palestinian peace negotiations have been restarted, a truce declared, and a fledgling Palestinian leadership established that might actually be prepared to make a real peace with Israel.

That's every country from the Khyber Pass to the Mediterranean Sea. Everywhere you look, the forces of moderation have been strengthened. This is a huge strategic advance not just for the region but for the world, because this region in its decades-long stagnation has incubated the world's most virulent anti-American, anti-Western, anti-democratic and anti-modernist fanaticism.

This is not to say that the Near East has been forever transformed. It is only to say that because of American resolution and action, there is a historic possibility for such a transformation.

It all hinges, however, on success in Iraq. On America not being driven out of Iraq the way it was driven out of Lebanon and Somalia -- which is what every terrorist and every terrorist state wants to see happen. And with everything at stake, what is the left doing? Everything it can to undermine the enterprise. By implying both that it was launched fraudulently (see yellowcake, above) and, alternately, that it has ensnared us in a hopeless quagmire.

Yes, the cost is great. The number of soldiers killed is relatively very small, but every death is painful and every life uniquely valuable. But remember that just yesterday we lost 3,000 lives in one day. And if this region is not transformed, on some future day we will lose 300,000.

Charles Krauthammer is a Pulitzer Prize award winning syndicated columnist for The Washington Post Writers Group, 1150 15th Street, N.W., Washington, D.C. 20071-9200.

http://www.daily-journal.com/content/?id=31549

Reality hard for left to explain

August 01, 2003

By Charles Krauthammer

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/news/956243/posts?page=54#54

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

Now back from holiday and trying to catch up on the world... Thank you for your work in keeping this daily thread going, DoctorZIn!

huh?

Abbas Abdi...I don't recall who this is. Do you?

"Nobody expects to see Mr Mortezavi in the defendant's stand."

How about in front of a firing squad?

Good article.