Free Republic

(IsraelNN.com) Iranian anti-regime activists are hoping for an Israeli technological hand to help them fight the Islamic Republic. As of now, hundreds of protesters have been killed by the regime, which is evidently using Arabic-speaking armed thugs from Hizbullah to help perpetrate the violence. "Dear Israeli Brothers and Sisters," writes Iranian dissident Arash Irandoost, "Iran needs your help more than ever now. And we will be eternally grateful

Chinese dissidents emulate anti-Soviet heroes with Charter 08 Chinese intellectuals have challenged the country's Communist leaders to end one-party rule with the launch of Charter 08, a throw-back to the Charter 77 declaration of Soviet-era Czechoslovakian dissidents. By Richard Spencer in Beijing Last Updated: 3:56PM GMT 09 Dec 2008 The bold plea for political reform calls on the government to allow freedom of expression and association and to give up Communist Party control over the legal system. Its launch coincides with Wednesday's 60th anniversary of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and is one of the most dramatic steps taken...

A leading dissident who organised a charter signed by hundreds of Chinese thinkers, academics and writers calling for dramatic political and legal reforms was under arrest yesterday. Liu Xiaobo, a literary critic first jailed for his role in the 1989 Tiananmen Square demonstrations, was taken from his home in Beijing late on Monday by a dozen police officers and was asked to sign a document acknowledging his detention. They searched his flat and took away three computers, mobile phones and documents, friends told The Times. His arrest came hours before the release on the internet of the “08 Charter”, a...

"So this is how liberty dies... with thunderous applause." Sorry, I couldn't help but be reminded of this scene from "Revenge of the Sith." I only hope that Obama isn't as bad as Emperor Palpatine. Just think, in Star Wars, it took an evil emperor to give way to Luke Skywalker (Jindal? haha) and Princess Leia (Palin?)! Hope is not lost, my friends, keep your faith where it belongs and try and look at things optimistically. If things get bad, there's no one to blame but Obama which will only guarantee us victory the next time around!

Atlas Shrugged has been on my mind a great deal these past few weeks. I don't hold with Ayn Rand on everything -- her view of what constitutes "morality," for example, is in complete opposition to my closely held religious faith. And she could have used a good editor; the damn book could have been half its size but just as effective. However, Rand did have incredible foresight into the political and socioeconomic ills that were occurring around her and that abound, nearly unchecked, in our world of 2008. Apparently, I'm not the only person who has been thinking along these...

Congratulations to Barack Obama. America has transcended race and this is a historic election in that regard. It is now time for all of America to move beyond the politics of race relations and unite in common as one people. This election should finally put the race-baiters such as Jesse Jackson and Al Sharpton out of business. Conservatism has been put in exile. The decision America made tonight was a poor one. The answer for Republicans cannot be to despair and surrrender America to this onslaught of liberalism, but rather to return to Republican principles and remain steadfastly dedicated to...

8 years ago our beloved W (Dubya) was elected and now we have an H (Aitch). I am in total shock that our United States elected someone we know next to nothing about. With so many unanswered questions why did it not matter to almost 55% of Americans? I am in shock that Murtha was re-elected. I am in shock that the polls were right. Now is the time to not over-react, but to begin laying a foundation for a future victory. What issues are good ones for a grass roots movement? Abortion? Faith? Flat Tax? Property rights? It is...

We are now the opposition and as such the historic responsibility to maintain the Republic has now fallen to us. Capitalists, conservatives, and all free thinking citizens do not despair for, all is not lost. While the days ahead may appear foreboding and uncertain, there is hope, and it lies within each of us. The fire of freedom that burns in the bosom of each and every citizen must not be squelched by the developments of the recent past. Yes, it would appear at first glance that this great nation has taken a whiplash inducing turn to the left, but...

Freedom, Liberty, Personal Responsibility, and general Conservative principles suffered a crushing defeat tonight. The concept of limited government seems dead. In an election I will remember as the choice of the lesser of two evils, evil won. I am tired. I am tired of choosing between bad and worse. I am tired of supporting a party that has lost its way. I am tired of Republicans whose motto is “we aren’t quite as bad as the alternative.” I am tired of liberals of both parties expanding entitlements, taking away liberties, raising my taxes, bankrupting the country, and calling me selfish...

Do not go gentle into that good night by Dylan ThomasDo not go gentle into that good night, Old age should burn and rave at close of day; Rage, rage against the dying of the light.Though wise men at their end know dark is right, Because their words had forked no lightning they Do not go gentle into that good night. Good men, the last wave by, crying how bright Their frail deeds might have danced in a green bay, Rage, rage against the dying of the light.Wild men who caught and sang the sun in flight, And learn, too...

Yes, we are dissapointed, yes we will whine a bit. But as some others have posted, we need to seek opportunity from adversity. There is no better time to begin to form a new and improved republican party. It must start tommorrow and involve all of us who love this country, and what this party used to be, and what this country can be. Do you remember all of those years that the Democrats were falling apart (not long ago) and was almost a doomed party? We are where we are today because of the failure of our party leaders....

My first vanity, but I do not care. The first battle to take back the country from liberal thought and rebuild the conservative coalition is THE FAIRNESS DOCTRINE. Somehow, someway TWENTY PERCENT of so called conservatives voted FOR Obama. NOTHING explains 20 percent of "conservatives" voting for Obama. Stay home? Maybe. But what in the HELL is a real conservative doing voting for the most liberal person in the Senate, and the most Liberal candidate ever? We conservatives have let the liberals take over the media, the schools and the cultural agenda. Now they have the media and the treasury....

Chinese dissident tipped to win Nobel peace prize Hu Jia could be awarded the Nobel peace prize to continue human rights pressure on China after the Beijing Olympics * Gwladys Fouché in Oslo * guardian.co.uk, * Wednesday September 24 2008 13:06 BST This year's Nobel peace prize could be awarded to a Chinese dissident to highlight China's human rights record in the wake of the Olympic Games, according to experts who closely follow the workings of the award. A likely candidate to receive the prize, the winner of which will be announced on October 10 in Oslo, is Hu Jia,...

Bush at U.N.: 'We Must Stand United' Iranian President Rails Against Zionist Bankers By BENNY AVNI | September 24, 2008 Delivering a speech redolent of classical European anti-Semitism, the Iranian leader accused Zionists of controlling the banks and was embraced yesterday by listeners at the General Assembly. He exchanged a long hug with the Assembly president and was feted afterward with mostly friendly questions from handpicked reporters. Mr. Ahmadinejad's speech — in which he accused "Zionists" of domineering Americans and Europeans through their banking and political activities, and predicted the rise of a "righteous and perfect human being" in their...

BEIJING (Reuters) - Chinese police have arrested a prominent Internet dissident for violating his probation terms, a rights group said, as the country steps up a pre-Olympic crackdown on dissent to ensure the Games go smoothly. Du Daobin, from the central province of Hebei, was given a suspended sentence for subversion in 2004 having been detained by police in Wuhan for posting online essays in support of fellow dissident, Liu Di. Du was then released into house arrest, Reporters Without Borders said in an emailed statement, but was arrested this week having been accused of posting articles on overseas websites...

"In this column, I want to provide you with my responses to some of the more common questions and misunderstandings regarding my pastoral action." wrote the Archbishop in the diocesan newspaper The Leaven. "Governor Sebelius holds the highest elective office in the state of Kansas, making her the most prominent Catholic in public life," responded the archbishop to accusations of "singling out" Sebelius. "It is a time-intensive process to enter into verbal and written dialogue, as is necessary, to insure a person is aware of the spiritual and moral consequences of their actions, as well as to understand the scandal...

Iran dissident defies jail fighting for equality By Kay Biouki in Tehran, and Gethin Chamberlain Last Updated: 12:31am GMT 02/03/2008 A woman facing jail in Iran for speaking out against the regime of President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad has denounced the country's Islamic revolution for "destroying a generation" of Iranians. Parvin Ardalan: 'Resistance has become a way of life for us' Parvin Ardalan, 41, said women and religious and cultural minorities faced discrimination under the hard-line policies adopted by Tehran after the mullahs seized power in 1979. Miss Ardalan is due to fly to Stockholm this week to receive the Olof Palme...

Night after night, from her cell in solitary confinement, Mehrnoushe Solouki could hear the anguished crying of fellow inmates in Tehran's Evin prison. When the French-Iranian filmmaker asked her guards about it, they were clear: The cries were not from hardened criminals but female activists, artists, and intellectuals locked up for nothing more than their political beliefs. Since January 18, Solouki has been back in Paris, safe in the warm embrace of family and friends -- and far from Evin prison. Yet it still haunts her. A doctoral film student at Canada’s University of Quebec, Solouki traveled to Tehran in...

Do you remember the brave moderate Iranian Ayatollah Boroujerdi who was arrested by the regime last year??? ... Not much has been reported on Ayatollah Boroujerdi since his arrest except one story that claimed he was suffering terribly and that he was sentenced to death. Boroujerdi's only crime is that he stood up to the hardliners in the brutal Iranian regime. Today Michael Ledeen at Pajamas Media is asking readers to sign ** this petition ** to help save Ayatollah Bourujerdi from death.

As I mentioned, dissident lay and priest groups whined about Pope Benedict not meeting with them. Unfortunately for the 'We are church' group (largely the equivalence of boomers), then-Cardinal Ratzinger condemned the group's agenda by name. The New York Times, of course, lent them an ear: “We are good Catholics, of course,” said Martha Heizer, vice president of We Are Church, a group that neatly symbolizes the troubles that Roman Catholicism faces in Europe. “We are in the church and stayed in the church.”Planning for We Are Church began in Austria in 1995 and the organization has since grown...

HAVANA (Reuters) - Cuba on Friday released its longest-serving political prisoner Francisco Chaviano Gonzalez, who spent more than 13 years in jail, the communist-run country's main human rights group said. Chaviano, 54, was arrested in May 1994, convicted of revealing state security secrets and sentenced to 15 years in prison, the Cuban Commission for Human Rights and National Reconciliation said in a statement. He was released on parole. The former mathematics professor, dissident and human rights activist was listed by Amnesty International as one of Cuba's 72 prisoners of conscience. The rights group said his military trial in 1994 fell...

China's dissidents, intellectuals ask party leaders to honor rights APPEAL JOINS OTHERS CONCERNED ABOUT OLYMPICS CRACKDOWN By Edward Cody Washington Post Article Launched: 08/08/2007 01:29:05 AM PDT BEIJING - A group of prominent Chinese dissidents and intellectuals called on the Communist Party government Tuesday to honor its human rights commitments out of respect for the Olympic spirit and next summer's Beijing Games. The unusually blunt appeal, in an open letter to the party's top three leaders, added respected Chinese voices to a chorus of foreign complaints of human rights abuses as China begins the one-year countdown to the Olympic Games...

"Vladimir Bukovksy, the 63-year old former Soviet dissident, fears that the European Union is on its way to becoming another Soviet Union. In a speech he delivered in Brussels last week Mr Bukovsky called the EU a “monster” that must be destroyed, the sooner the better, before it develops into a fullfledged totalitarian state. ... Hence, we have now been warned. Meanwhile they are introducing more and more ideology. The Soviet Union used to be a state run by ideology. Today’s ideology of the European Union is social-democratic, statist, and a big part of it is also political correctness. I...

A Syrian court has sentenced a leading dissident to 12 years in prison on charges of undermining national security. The judge said he had encouraged foreign countries to attack Syria. Kamal Labwani was arrested in 2005 after he returned to Damascus from a visit to Europe and the United States, where he met with White House officials. Mr Labwani is founder of the Liberal Democratic Union, which works to promote democracy in Syria. Last month, human rights activists reported that he was being held underground in the dark and his health was deteriorating rapidly. The United States has appealed to...

Guangdong, television pirates transmit anti government messages from state TV On the night of May 1st a group of hackers re-routed the provinces stat elite signal and for over an hour transmitted messages against the Communist Party. No one has so far claimed the attack. Guangzhou (AsiaNews/Agencies) – Unknown television pirates successfully re- routed the television signal in the rich southern province of Guangdong and for over an hour transmitted messages against the Communist Party. The attack took place on the night of May 1st, the national Labour Day holiday. Local media and dozens of witnesses report that between 8...

Iran's Crackdown - Hostage Crisis a Distraction? April 05, 2007 New York Post Amir Taheri Was the crisis over the capture of the British host ages part of a smoke screen for a crackdown on dissidents in Iran? (excerpt) The crackdown is beginning to gather pace. Several publications critical of government have been shut down... (excerpt) And now the regime seems to be setting the stage for show trials that recall the worst days of Stalinism in the Soviet Union. Last month, a member of the Majlis, the regime's ersatz parliament, was sent to prison for six years on trumped-up...

Student rebels in Iran expelled and earmarked for army · Crackdown follows protest during Ahmadinejad visit · Compulsory service seen as government revenge Robert Tait in Tehran March 2, 2007 The Guardian Iranian students involved in an angry protest against the president, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, have been expelled and earmarked for compulsory military service in an apparent act of official retribution. Authorities at Tehran's Amir Kabir University, a traditional hotbed of student protest, have ended the studies of 54 students, ostensibly for repeatedly failing their exams. However, most of the students singled out are political activists who took part in December's...

Top Dissident Cleric Slams Ahmadinejad Monday January 22, 2007 2:01 PM By ALI AKBAR DAREINI Associated Press Writer TEHRAN, Iran (AP) - Iran's most senior dissident cleric said President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's aggressive nuclear diplomacy had harmed the country, joining a chorus of criticism that has included even the hard-line leader's conservative allies. The comments by Grand Ayatollah Hossein Ali Montazeri, released Monday, reflected a growing feeling among many that Ahmadinejad has concentrated too much on fiery, anti-U.S. speeches and not enough on the economy. Montazeri, 85, is one of a few grand ayatollahs, the most senior theologians of the Shiite...

Poisoned Russian spy Alexander Litvinenko died on Thursday in an intensive care ward, London's University College Hospital said. Litvinenko, a fierce critic of the Russian government, suffered a rapid deterioration in his health on Thursday, but doctors still were unable to determine the cause of his death, a spokesman said in a statement.

Iranian Dissident Trapped in Moscow Airport Iranian dissident Zahra Kamalfar has been living with her children under unspeakable conditions in the transit area of Moscow’s Sheremetyevo Airport for 73 days. A one-time demonstrator against the extremist theocracy with a lengthy prison sentence, she escaped from an Iranian prison when on a two-day furlough to visit her children. BY Michael Ledeen This video documents an all-too common tragedy: Iranian opponents of the regime wandering the world in search of a country willing to let them live in safety. In many ways, it is reminiscent of the plight of the European Jews...

Vietnamese Authority has Injects Bui Kim Thanh Daily with Unknown Drugs . Nov-04-2006 Vietnamese Police in 3rd District, Ho Chi Minh City has illegally arrested pro-democracy dissident Bui Kim Thanh, member of 21st Democratic Party and sent her to the "Mental Hospital" in Bien Hoa, Ho Chi Minh City Vietnam. It is said that on Nov 02-2006, Police detained Bui in Cho Quan Mental Hospital but Dr.Tru and Dr.Hong confirmed that Bui Kim Thanh who are not mentally ill and later released her from the Hospital on the same day .However, on Nov-04-2006, her husband Ha Si Quyen and the...

Police hunt farting dissident Police in Poland have launched a nationwide hunt for a man who farted loudly when asked what he thought of the president. Hubert Hoffman, 45, was charged with "contempt for the office of the head of state" for his actions after he was stopped by police in a routine check at a Warsaw railway station. He complained that under President Lech Kaczynski and his twin brother Jaroslaw, the country was returning to a Communist style dictatorship. When told to show more respect for the country's rulers, he farted loudly and was promptly arrested. Hoffmann was arrested...

The recent announcement by the Vietnamese government that they will release "some" dissidents in a general amnesty reminds me of a conversation I had with a former U.S. State Department official about his dealings with the Soviets during the Cold War. "Throw them a dissident" was what he said and he described how the Soviets would play the stalling game by keeping Western diplomatic pressure at bay for a time. Every now and then the Soviets would just release a dissident from the gulags. The pressure would ease off for a while until it built up again and they would...

Vietnam to Free Dissident By Matt Steinglass Hanoi 28 August 2006 Steinglass report - Download 222k Listen to Steinglass report The government of Vietnam says it has granted amnesty to one of the country's highest profile dissidents, Pham Hong Son.  Western governments and human rights organizations considered Son a political prisoner.The Vietnamese government announced on Monday it was granting amnesty to Pham Hong Son, as part of the freeing of over five thousand other prisoners. Such amnesties are often announced in honor of Vietnam's independence day on September 2. A doctor in his mid-30s, Son was arrested in March 2002...

Dissident Arab Gets the Treatment by Ahmad Al-Qloushi What Ahmad Al Qloushi says: * "The Borders of [Israel] should be from the Mediterranean to the Jordan River" * "America and Israel are great democracies" * "I could never believe how Jews were portrayed in my school in Kuwait" * "When I met a Jewish person in America for the first time my initial beliefs were confirmed" * "Walid Shoebat is a brave man and incredible human being and has done more for the Arab world in a short time than all Arab leaders put together" I am a 17-year-old Kuwaiti...

Latin America: Donald Rumsfeld once observed that Venezuelans had a way of fixing political problems on their own, with no need of U.S. intervention. The dramatic prison break of a union boss may be the first sign. Carlos Ortega's escape Sunday from a Venezuelan maximum security military prison must have sent a shiver through the tyrannical leftist regime of President Hugo Chavez. The tough union boss had crossed Chavez before and was serving a 16-year sentence for leading a vast oil-worker strike in 2002-03. Like Lech Walesa of Poland, Ortega called for independent union leadership at Venezuela's state oil company...

US assails Iran's treatment of dissidents after jailed student's death The United States harshly condemned what it called Iran's "severe repression of dissidents" following the death of a jailed student activist, reportedly as the result of a long hunger strike. Student activist Akbar Mohammadi died Sunday in Tehran's Evin prison, where he had been held for his role in pro-democracy student demonstrations in July 1999. State Department spokesman Sean McCormack said Mohammadi's detention "was not an isolated case" and his death was symptomatic of the Iranian regime's harsh treatment of its opponents. "The United States condemns the Iranian government's severe...

No Extradition for Vietnamese Dissident A Korean court on Thursday turned down a request for the extradition of a Vietnamese dissident Hanoi accuses of terrorism. The Seoul High Court ruled that Nguyen Huu Chanh (58), who described as a criminal in its extradition request to Seoul, is a political prisoner and can thus not be extradited to Vietnam. That marks the first time South Korea has turned down an extradition request. As this verdict can not be appealed to the Supreme Court, Nguyen is now a free man. But that is likely to spark diplomatic tensions since Hanoi and Seoul...

The Real Iranian Threat By ROYA HAKAKIAN July 15, 2006 At long last, some good news from Iran reaches U.S. shores. Akbar Ganji, one of Iran's leading advocates for democratic change, will arrive in the U.S. today. More than his arrival, it is his survival that should count as a small miracle: No one in Iran has so boldly broken political taboos and lived to tell the tale. Mr. Ganji has denounced the country's rulers as members of a fascist regime and, borrowing the famous words that Ayatollah Khomeini used to address the Shah, has said that Supreme Leader Sayyid...

About 50 people demonstrated outside St. Mary’s Catholic Church and School Saturday afternoon, calling for greater openness and inclusiveness in the Roman Catholic Church. The event concluded the 10th anniversary conference of Call to Action Nebraska, part of a nationwide organization seeking reforms in the church. In 1996, Lincoln Bishop Fabian Bruskewitz announced that local Catholics who joined Call to Action would be excommunicated.  Lincoln is the only diocese in the country to impose such sanctions, said Rachel Pokora, president of Nebraska CTA. About half of those participating in Saturday’s “non-violent action� were CTA members from other parts of the...

Fugitive pleads with US to 'liberate' Iran Sarah Baxter, Washington FOR almost eight months, Amir Abbas Fakhravar was held in solitary confinement in a soundproof cell in Iran. His bare, constantly lit surroundings were all a creamy white — the walls, the floor, his clothes and the door, with a slit through which white rice would be delivered in a white bowl by guards wearing slippers to muffle their footfall. Amnesty International calls his case the first known example of “white torture” in Iran and it nearly drove Fakhravar mad. He was stuck in a terrifying, real-life version of the...

China Demands That Albania Return Ex-U.S. Detainees By Edward Cody Washington Post Foreign Service Wednesday, May 10, 2006; Page A20 BEIJING, May 9 -- China demanded Tuesday that five Chinese Muslims flown to Albania after release from the U.S. military prison at Guantanamo Bay be turned over to Chinese authorities for prosecution as terrorists. A Foreign Ministry spokesman, Liu Jianchao, said Albania's decision to accept the five and consider their application for political asylum on a request from the Bush administration violated U.N. conventions and international law. He said China had lodged formal complaints with the Albanian and U.S. governments...

Chinese regime destroys facilities COURAGE: Dr. Wenyi Wang, left, faces six months in prison for outburst. "Annie" the anonomous ex-wife of surgeon who transplanted "living donor" organs of Falun Gong practitioners, tells of death threats. They sit under photos of dead Falun Gong practitioners who had their organs removed. (Lisa Fan/The Epoch Times)Dr. Wenyi Wang, the Epoch Times journalist who made headlines last week for interrupting a speech at the White House by Chinese leader Hu Jintao, defended her actions during a press conference Wednesday, saying that thousands of lives hang in the balance as the Chinese communist regime prepares...

/begin my translation Anti-Kim Jong-il  Activist, Park Kap-dong,  Assaulted in Japan Park Kap-dong(age:87,) who is the Chairman of 'Salvation Front for Unified Democratic Korea,' an anti-N. Korea organization in Japan,  was assaulted by somebody in front of his office in Tokyo on the night of Apr. 13. Tokyo Police Agency is doing an investigation, treating it as a terrorist incident. Mr. Park finished his dinner at 8:30pm on Apr. 13, and was about to enter his office located in Chiyota District of downtown Tokyo, when his head was hit from behind by a blunt object. He lost consciousness and...

March 17, 2006 Sane Chinese Put in Asylum, Doctors Find By JOSEPH KAHN BEIJING, March 16 — Dutch psychiatrists have determined that a prominent Chinese dissident who spent 13 years in a police-run psychiatric institution in Beijing did not have mental problems that would justify his incarceration, two human rights groups said Thursday. The psychiatrists spent two days testing the dissident, Wang Wanxing, in Germany five months after China released him and sent him abroad. They said in a statement that their examination "did not reveal any form of mental disorder." The report could add fuel to charges that the...

February 13, 2006, Counting the Minutes A conversation with Iranian dissident Amir Abbas Fakhravar. Q&A by Jason Lee Steorts Amir Abbas Fakhravar is one of the most prominent dissidents in Iran. A former medical student and journalist, he was arrested and imprisoned after the publication of his anti-regime book This Place Is Not a Ditch. While on a leave from prison he fled the authorities, and has been on the run ever since. From the Iranian underground, he coordinates the activities of various dissident groups, and for this reason the regime has (according to his knowledge) issued a standing order...

Yahoo's general counsel, Michael Callahan, will join executives from Google, Microsoft and Cisco before the House subcommittee on Africa, Global Human Rights and International Operations on Wednesday. All four companies have come under fire for their dealings in China — from agreeing to censor their search or blogging tools to providing hardware that makes government surveillance of Internet users easier. The Paris-based group Reporters Without Borders revealed last Wednesday that a Chinese division of Yahoo had provided information to authorities that contributed to the conviction in 2003 of Li Zhi, a former civil servant who had criticized local officials online....

/begin my translation N. Korea: Armed Men Attack N. Korea's Tumen Border  It is revealed that, just before the Lunar New Year's Day, multiple (armed) attacks on border guard by unidentified men occurred along N. Korea's northern border area. Especially, indications are that some of attackers were carrying automatic weapons and their movements are well-coordinated, leading us to wonder about their background. Multiple Attacks: According to the sources on N. Korea, on the evening of Jan. 28, a border guard at Namyang Worker's District, Onsung County, N. Hamkyong Province, spotted a few men crossing Tumen River from Kai-san-tun area of China, and attempted to arrest...

The American mass media are like tired old dogs, dutifully fetching official lies on command and dropping them like bones at the feet of an unsuspecting public. We in turn reward them by buying both the products and the myths they sell us. Eventually, however, the products fail and the myths unravel. When the government's popularity wanes sufficiently, despite the support of a compliant press, even old dogs can come up with new tricks, reviving the lost art of investigative reporting. Take the Pat Tillman story. Remember him? He was the star National Football League defensive back who, after the...

Akbar Ganji, Iran's most outstanding dissident, is in renewed danger. LAST March, during the Persian New Year holiday, Akbar Ganji, Iran's best-known political prisoner, was cracking jokes into his mobile phone at the edge of the Iranian desert. Chubby from festive dishes of polov (rice, often with lamb) and delighted to be surrounded by his family, he showered this correspondent's two-year-old son with kisses before speeding off to keep an appointment with a dissident ayatollah and return to Tehran's Evin prison by the end of his holiday probation. Nine months on, he is a sick man, severely weakened by the...