Free Republic

Human Rights Travesty By Kenneth R. Timmerman FrontPageMagazine.com | July 23, 2007 If human rights abuses were ranked like baseball careers, Iran’s ruling clerics and the mighty midget they’ve installed as president would deserve honored places in the 21st Century’s Hall of Shame. On July 10, Iran’s Interior ministry confirmed the sentence, handed down ten days earlier by a court in the north of the country, condemning a man to death by stoning. If you’ve never witnessed a stoning (and most of us haven’t, I trust), you can get a flavor for the barbarity of this Koranic punishment from a...

Iran: The Anti-democracy November 12, 2007 Los Angeles Times Akbar Ganji The Islamic regime brutally stifles dissent and determines rights and privileges based on religion. The Islamic Republic of Iran is master of the double standard. For instance, the regime believes it has the right to establish political groups in other countries, such as Lebanon's Hezbollah, the Iraqi Islamic Supreme Council and a number of groups in Afghanistan. It openly supports Hamas to the tune of millions of dollars -- another example of this general modus operandi. So, by logical extension, the Islamic Republic asserts that opponents of a government...

Manouchehr Ganji: Help set Iran free Democracy movement requires West's support September 7, 2006 What many Americans don't realize is that – 28 years after taking power – the ruling mullahs and their henchmen are hated in Iran and their power is shaky. Why? The Iranian people, including the vast majority of those under the age of 30, know them for who they are. So while the government is busy with its foreign adventures – including an outrageous Washington visit this week by former Iranian President Mohammad Khatami – the younger people and women are in the forefront of an...

Iranian dissident Akbar Ganji declined to meet White House officials during a visit to the US, he has told the BBC.

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...

Top News Story Financial Times WASHINGTON/TEHRAN: The US has prepared several plans to attack Iran since 2003, a former intelligence expert with the US military reported Sunday in the Washington Post. According to security analyst William Arkin, the US Central Command has been devising war scenarios with Iran at least since May 2003, shortly after the US-led invasion of neighbouring Iraq. One of the possible campaigns, entitled TIRANNT (theatre Iran near term) dealt with clash of US and Iranian ground troops, taking into account US experiences in its recent Iraq invasion, Arkin said. In addition, the US drew up...

Top News Story AGENCE FRANCE-PRESSE TEHRAN -- Iran boasted yesterday it could defeat any American military action over its nuclear drive, in one of the Islamic regime's boldest challenges yet to the United States. "You can start a war but it won't be you who finishes it," said Gen. Yahya Rahim Safavi, the head of the Revolutionary Guards and among the regime's most powerful figures. "The Americans know better than anyone that their troops in the region and in Iraq are vulnerable. I would advise them not to commit such a strategic error," he told reporters on the sidelines...

Top News Story Congress holding up funding of Iranian opposition broadcasts into Iran? Eli Lake, The New York Sun reported that the Senate Foreign Relations Committee and the House appropriations panel are resisting administration efforts to fund independent Iranian broadcast efforts into Iran and instead want to solely fund Voice of America and Radio Farda. But Iranian opposition groups claim VOA and Radio Farda are undermining pro-democracy efforts inside of Iran.   ElBaradei leave Iran empty handed. The Times reported that Mohamed ElBaradei delivered in person in Tehran a message from the four permanent Security Council members.The New York...

Top News Story The world responds to Iran's announcement. The Wall Street Journal reported that Iran in formal breach of a U.N. Security Council resolution and now has the know how to make a nuclear bomb.Reuters reported that the UN is unlikely to act sooner than May on the question of Iran's nuclear ambitions.The Washington Post reported that Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice said that the United Nations Security Council must now take "strong steps." The permanent 5 (plus Germany) will meet next week in Moscow.The Washington Post reported that Russia's Foreign Ministry criticized Iran saying: "We believe that...

Top News Story Iran's big announcement: "will soon join the nuclear club." AP reported that Iran has successfully enriched uranium for the first time and Ahmadinejad added that the country "will soon join the club of countries with nuclear technology."Mehran Riazaty reported Iranian leaders were meeting with many of its neighbors the morning of Iran's nuclear announcement. The report reminds us that Iranian leaders are seeking to increase the price of oil to $100 a barrel.IranMania reported that the Iranian Defense Minister said that Tehran is ready to sign non-aggression pacts with countries in the region.Kuwait News Agency reported...

Top News Story Even the IAEA experts say Iran is moving closer to being able to create a bomb. Telegraph reported that teams of nuclear experts attached to the IAEA are saying Iran's ayatollahs are moving closer to their goal of building an atom bomb.   Iran to make nuclear announcement: Tuesday. Reuters reported that Iran's president promised "good news" within days about the country's nuclear program.Mehran Riazaty produced a roundup of Iranian press reports discussing Ahmadinejad's coming announcement on Iran’s nuclear program.   Solana: "We have to begin thinking about..." sanctions. The Washington Post reported that EU foreign...

Top News Story Brits tracking Iranian spies in Iraq. Sunday Mirror reported that British Special Forces are tracking up to 40 Iranian agents who have slipped over the border into southern Iraq.   Tehran fire linked to secret uranium enrichment? Ha'aretz reported that a fire broke out in a forest north of Tehran on Saturday, not far from an area intelligence agencies suspected illegal nuclear activity.   Iraqi leaders denounce Mubarak. The New York Times reported that Iraqi leaders joined together to denounce President Hosni Mubarak of Egypt today for publicly asserting that Iraq was already engulfed in civil...

Top News Story Middle East News WASHINGTON [MENL] -- Israel's military was said to be unable to destroy Iran's nuclear facilities. A former leading U.S. intelligence chief said Israel does not have sufficient assets or support for a major attack required to destroy Iran's nuclear weapons program. The intelligence chief cited the absence of Israeli aircraft carriers and the need for warplanes to enter the air space of Arab rivals. "The United States is the only country in the world that has capability of carrying out the estimated thousand strike sorties needed to destroy the Iran's nuclear program," [Ret.]...

Top News Story Jerusalem Post The American government is planning a military strike on Iran, including bombing its nuclear reactor, according to an investigative report due to be published next week in The New Yorker magazine. According to the report, which quotes a former senior CIA official, President George Bush and his administration see in Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad "a new Adolf Hitler." A senior Pentagon advisor, quoted in the article, said that the White House was convinced the only way to solve the problem would be to change the balance of power with Iran through war. Another former...

Top News Story Senior Iranian official in Washington DC lobbying for US/Iran talks! The Financial Times reported that a senior Iranian official, Mohammad Nahavandian, has flown to Washington to “lobby” high level US/Iran talks, but the Bush administration is resisting.   The real reason why Iran wants US/Iran talks. Iran Press News reported that the Iranian press is discussing the real reason for the Islamic regime is attempting to hold discussions with the U.S. regarding Iraq.   More bad news regarding Iran's nuclear program. Telegraph reported American intelligence believes that the nose cone of the Shahab-3 ballistic missile has...

Top News Story Iran's Earthquake victims arrested. Iran Press News reported that the Iranian regime has been arresting earthquake victims who complained the lack of relief, calling them “agitators and hoodlums”. One example: no more than 2000 tents have been sent to provide shelter 250,000 people. No private citizen is permitted to deliver any assistance.   Unpaid workers in Iran committing suicide. Iran Press News reported that in recent months, the number of suicides among unpaid workers in Iran has skyrocketed; some of the workers have even committed suicide with their families.   Iran's "world's fastest torpedo" easy to...

Top News Story Iran's military war game tests. Bill Gertz, The Washington Times referring to Iran's tests of an older Scud missile variant last week reported that the Pentagon said Iran often exaggerates its military developments.MosNews reported that the chairman of the Russian State Duma said that the latest demonstration of military force by Iran "is not quite appropriate now."India Defence reported that Iran successfully tested a "super-modern flying boat" which Iran claimed: "no radar at sea or in the air can locate it. It can lift out of the water... and can launch missiles with precise targeting while...

Top News Story Iran Military war games: "We have very important news... in the next few days." Reuters reported that Iran test fired a new torpedo in the Strait of Hormuz that they claim are "capable of destroying enemy warships and submarines at any depth and moving at any speed." They added: "We are going to have very important news that will make our nation proud in the next few days."The Financial Times reported that Iran’s announcement that it had tested a new torpedo in the Persian Gulf is driving up oil prices.ABC News reported that Richard Clarke said:...

Top News Story Is the regime changing tactics as it shows off its "big sticks?" Today's stick: its underwater missile. Reuters reported that a senior Iranian naval commander Iran has test-fired a sonar-evading underwater missile that can outpace any enemy warship.Ilan Berman, American Foreign Policy Council reported that Iran is assembling a new class of hybrid intermediate ballistic missiles that bring nearly every city in Western Europe within striking distance.   Iranian regime lowers rhetoric (a little) but no changes. Reuters reported that Iran blasted the U.N. Security Council for trying to pressure it into halting its uranium enrichment...

Top News Story Intel: Iran would strike US targets in response to military strikes. The Washington Post reported that U.S. intelligence and terrorism experts say they believe Iran would respond to U.S. military strikes with attacks against U.S. targets worldwide. Britain secret talks about strike against Iran? Denied. Telegraph reported plans by Britain to hold a high-level meeting which will take place in the Ministry of Defense at which senior defense chiefs and government officials to consider the consequences of an attack on Iran.BBC News later reported that the Ministry of Defense said: "No such meeting between defense, foreign...