On Thursday, we posted "Iran Snapshot: The Music of Resistance" about artists who persist despite the regime's restrictions. An EA reader points us to this three-part YouTube video on the work of three Tehran musicians --- the second part features Maral Afsharian, who was profiled in the Thursday article:
Maral Afshairan 
Admiral Mike Mullen and General Ashfaq Pervez KiyaniThe US Joint Chiefs of Staff Chairman, Admiral Michael Mullen, was in a mood to name and shame on Wednesday.
Without mincing his words, he made it clear that ISI’s continued links with the Haqqani network were at the core of Pakistan’s problematic relations with the United States.
He said ISI’s relationship with the network was unacceptable to the American leadership.“The ISI has a rich history of how they operated in this part of the world, to protect their own country; I understand that some of the aspects of that we strongly disagree with and that is something that we continue to address.”
Ahmadinejad's opponents use the president's relationship with Mashaei for mockery and to score political points. Numerous IRPO contacts have related well known anecdotes about Mashaei's religious views and firm belief in the imminent return of the Twelfth Imam. Among them is the political "urban myth" in Tehran that Ahmadinejad's devotion to Mashaei is said to stem from his belief that Mashaei is in fact in direct contact with the Twelfth Imam. According to these rumors, Mashaei allegedly occasionally enters a trance-like state to communicate with the Twelfth Imam or will sometimes randomly say "hello" to no one at all and then explain that the Twelfth Imam just passed by.
Thursday, April 21, 2011 at 23:00 | Ali Yenidunya in EA Middle East and Turkey, Middle East and Iran 
UPDATE 22 APRIL: The Supreme Election Board, after eight hours of discussions, has reinstated the candidacy of seven independent candidates.
The Baord had vetoed 12 mostly Kurdish applicants, including two current MPs.
Six Peace and Democracy Party (BDP) candidates and one independent were re-instated. There was no word about the other five who had been blocked.
Protests broke out in several cities across Turkey, with at least one person shot and killed by police on Wednesday, after the board's initial decision.
---
Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan was in Strasbourg, France last week, taking questions from the Council of Europe’s Parliamentary Assembly. When French MP Muriel Marland-Militello, whose grandfather was an Armenian born in Istanbul and escaped Turkey in 1915, asked how he would guarantee freedoms for religious minorities in Turkey, Erdogan said, “I believe this friend is French. She is also 'French” to Turkey', which is a saying in Turkish meaning that 'you don’t know anything about it'."
Thursday, April 21, 2011 at 12:19 | Scott Lucas in Africa, EA Global, EA Middle East and Turkey, Middle East and Iran 2030 GMT: My thanks to James Miller for taking you through the afternoon and early evening on the LiveBlog. With news slowing today, we are already looking forward to a lively Friday, with the prospect of mass protests in countries such as Syria and Yemen.
We will be back at 0600 GMT.
2030 GMT: Syrian activist Suhair Atassi writes that the Army has entered with tanks into Tahrir Square (formerly Clock Square) in Homs.
Maral Afsharian, with her ranging voice, powerful lyrics — sung in English — and her stunning features, is the perfect example of an artist from Tehran’s underground that is in many ways ahead of the times within her own musical community.
Her unique brand of electronic rock, first as the lead singer of the group Plastic Wave, and now as a solo artist, has begun to achieve attention worldwide. The band was even invited to play at the prestigious and avant-garde South-by-Southwest (SXSW) festival in Austin, Texas. Ultimately the members of the band were denied visas to attend SXSW.
2015 GMT: Rumours of the Day (President's Right-Hand Man Edition). Mashregh News says Ahemadinejad confidante Esfandiar Rahim-Mashai is in hospital for diabetes. Fars says he is in good health.
Bottom line: Rahim-Mashai was not with the President on Ahmadinejad's trip to Kurdistan yesterday and today. Any significance?
1400 GMT: International Front. Kuwait's Foreign Minister Sheikh Mohammad al-Salem al-Sabah has told Al Arabiya that an alleged Iranian spy cell had explosives to bomb "strategic" facilities: "We are talking about a cell whose task was not only to monitor and record the (US) military presence that is in their view hostile --- the American forces presence on Kuwait lands --- but it exceeded that."
The Foreign Minister claimed the cell, revealed last year, "had explosives and the intention to explode vital Kuwaiti facilities. They had names of officers and they had extremely sensitive information. This indicates bad intentions to harm Kuwaiti security."
Susan Rice and Avigdor LiebermanColum Lynch writes for Foreign Policy magazine:
In the aftermath of Israel's 2008-2009 intervention into the Gaza Strip, Susan E. Rice, the U.S. ambassador to the United Nations, led a vigorous campaign to stymie an independent U.N. investigation into possible war crimes, while using the prospect of such a probe as leverage to pressure Israel to participate in a U.S.-backed Middle East peace process, according to previously undisclosed diplomatic cables provided by the anti-secrecy website WikiLeaks....
The new documents, though consistent with public U.S. statements at the time opposing a U.N. investigation into Israeli military operations, reveal in extraordinary detail how America wields its power behind closed doors at the United Nations. They also demonstrate how the United States and Israel were granted privileged access to highly sensitive internal U.N. deliberations on an "independent" U.N. board of inquiry into the Gaza war, raising questions about the independence of the process.
In one pointed cable, Rice repeatedly prodded U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon to block a recommendation of the board of inquiry to carry out a sweeping inquiry into alleged war crimes by Israeli soldiers and Palestinian militants. In another cable, Rice issued a veiled warning to the president of the International Criminal Court, Sang-Hyun Song, that an investigation into alleged Israeli crimes could damage its standing with the United States at a time when the new administration was moving closer to the tribunal. "How the ICC handles issues concerning the Goldstone Report will be perceived by many in the US as a test for the ICC, as this is a very sensitive matter," she told him, according to a Nov. 3, 2009, cable from the U.S. mission to the United Nations.
Rice, meanwhile, assured Israeli Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman during an Oct. 21, 2009, meeting in Tel Aviv that the United States had done its utmost to "blunt the effects of the Goldstone report" and that she was confident she could "build a blocking coalition" to prevent any push for a probe by the Security Council, according to an Oct. 27, 2009 cable.
I joined BBC Newshour this afternoon to discuss the news that Britain is sending military advisors to Libya's oppositional National Transitional Council in Benghazi.
The BBC's "hook" for the interview was the analogy, made by critics of the move, that the despatch of advisors is similar to John F. Kennedy's creation of the Green Berets for advice and operations in South Vietnam from 1961.
For me, it's a false analogy, and it misses the important issues in Libya. The discussion begins at the 44-minute mark.
