The Latest from Iran (4 February): The Relay of Opposition

2200 GMT: To close the day, a video --- courtesy of The Flying Carpet Institute --- of a workers' demonstration in Arak on Wednesday:

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ri7KDzSP5n0[/youtube]

2155 GMT: The Amir Kabir student website, a valuable source of information throughout the post-election crisis, has been attacked by the Iranian Cyber Army.

2135 GMT: Brother, Where Art Thou (cont.)? Davoud Ahmadinejad, the brother of the President, has declared that he is ready to prove that the beliefs of Presidential Chief of Staff Esfandiar Rahim-Mashai, clash with Islam. Once again, the attack appears in Khabar Online, the publication close to Ali Larijani.

2125 GMT: Journalists and press managers have requested the freedom of Ali Ashraf Fathi, clergyman and writer of the Tourjaan weblog (named after the location where Fathi's father was killed during the Iran-Iraq War), who was arrested last week during the "40th Day" memorial for Grand Ayatollah Montazeri.

NEW Latest Iran Video: What Does the Iranian Public Really Think? (4 February)
NEW Iran Analysis: The Missing Numbers in the Economy
NEW Iran Analysis: How Turkey Can Break the Nuclear Stalemate
NEW Iran Spam, Spam, Lovely Spam: Mass E-mails, Old Polls, and “Analysis”
Iran Special: Full Text of Mousavi Answers for 22 Bahman (2 February)
Iran Snap Analysis: “Game-Changers” from Mousavi and Ahmadinejad
The Latest From Iran (3 February): Picking Up the Pace

2110 GMT: Crackdown and Blackout. So the regime's strategy of breaking up any mass movement on 22 Bahman continues. Iranian activists and websites such as Reporters and Humanrights Activists in Iran continue to document arrests, and there is even a claim that three members of the Committee of Human Rights Reporters --- Mehrdad Rahimi, Saeed Haeri, and Shiva Nazar-Ahari --- have been charged with "mohareb" (war against God).

Reports continue to circulate that Internet service has slowed significantly and even been halted in parts of Iran. Official explanations have included disruptions because of the loss of a major cable and "developments and expansions in the Tehran-Mashad corridor".


1930 GMT: We started the day with a sceptical post about a set of old polls being pushed to argue for the legitimacy of the Ahmadinejad Government. We've now posted full video of Wednesday's two-panel seminar at the New America Foundation which featured those polls, "What Does the Iranian Public Really Think?"

1730 GMT: We've posted an analysis from Persian2English, of the latest numbers (and missing numbers) on the Iranian economy.

1700 GMT: Domestic Case of the Day. Ayande News claims that Mahdi Kalhour, the President's Media Advisor, was called into a police station after beating up his ex-wife, Masumah Taheri, last night. Taheri, claiming an injured neck, has decided to sue Kalhour; the court hearing will begin on Sunday.

A few months ago, Kalhour's daughter sought asylum in Germany.

1500 GMT: Greetings from Beirut. 90 Lebanese intellectuals have issued a statement of support for the Green Movement.

1420 GMT: Kalemeh is reporting that the Qoba Mosque in Shiraz, which is led by Ayatollah Ali Mohammad Dastgheib, a critic of the Government, was attacked again last night. Last month, Dastgheib's offices were temporarily closed after pro-Government groups took over the mosque. There is also an English-language summary on the Facebook page supporting Mir Hossein Mousavi.

1400 GMT: The Ashura Trial. An Iranian activist has posted a translation of Wednesday's proceedings for the "first defendant", student at Damghan University:

1st defendant was charged with Moharebeh (war against God), being a corrupting agent & collusive acts against national security, propagandizing against the Islamic Republic & insulting high ranking officials.

1st defendant admitted to chanting "Death to Dictator", saying it was aimed at the President. He testified that he participated in four different protests. The 1st protest was the 40th (Day) memorial ceremony of the martyrs (30 July?). He went to 7 Tir Square, stayed for about 20 minutes, chanted "Death to Dictator", "Death to the Deceptive Government", & Allahu Akhbar. He was surprised to hear the more radical chants.

1st defendant said, at the Friday Prayers presided [over] by Ayatollah Rafsanjani, he along with his father & younger brother went to Qods street & video taped & took pictures of the crowd. 1st defendant also testified that he participated in Qods Day (18 September) protests, chanted pro-Ayatollah Sane'i slogans. He also said he chanted the slogan, "Not Gaza, not Lebanon, my life for Iran I will sacrifice."

He also participated in Ashura protest & video taped the crowd. After police used teargas, the crowd scattered at first & than gathered again & set a trash bin on fire. PPL were throwing stones at the police . He said at that time he was only video taping the scene. He then participated in throwing stones at the police who were standing far from the crowd. Once the crowd started to dissipate he went inside a home, stayed there for 20 minutes then left. On his way back home he saw a few injured people. Along with others he helped the injured & took them to the hospital. He than proceeded to go home.

On the way home he saw scenes that looked like war scenes. He video taped the war scenes. He did not send the videos to anyone, only showed them to friends. He testified that in 2008 he joined the Islamic Society, he & his family had reformist tendencies. He continued explaining that the elites claimed there was cheating in the election, he emphasized the point that many of the elites were absent from the President's confirmation ceremonies, then they announced there is a political coup. They asked us to come to the streets to protest & take our rights back.

The judge asked him about throwing stones on Ashura. The defendant explained because he had believed there was cheating in the elections, he went to the streets to protest the results. The judge than asked him about the flyers he distributed at Damghan University. He said he signed two petitions that demanded Ahmadinejad to resign.

At this point the defense attorney gave his short defense & asked the court for leniency for his client.

Judge than asked the 1st defendant to give his last defense. 1st defendant said he was capable of making decisions admitting that he made two mistakes, the first one leading to the second mistake. He said his first mistake was not to have researched the news sources & some groups. Second mistake was that even though he believed in Imam's path but, as the interrogator reminded him, he had forgotten Imam said "Support Velayat-e-Faqih (the Supreme Leader) so no harm can come to the country".

1st defendant continued to apologize to the Leader & asked for forgivness.

1210 GMT: Arrests and Sentences (cont.). Rah-e-Sabz has a round-up, including the detention of journalist Noushin Jafari, who covers cultural affairs for Etemaad newspaper.

1205 GMT: The Regional Diversion. Meanwhile, the US-Iran game of power-posing plays out. Major General Hassan Firouzabadi, the chief of staff of Iran's armed forces, has responded to the US declaration that it is providing anti-missile capability to four states on the Arabian peninsula:

They don't want to see good and growing relations between Iran and its neighbors in the Persian Gulf and thus started a psychological war....It is not new for us ... we were informed when they were installed, including about their exact locations ... Patriot missile could be easily deactivated by using simple tactics.

1200 GMT: Breaking Activism. AUT News summarises part of the regime's strategy to "win" on 22 Bahman (11 February), the anniversary of the 1979 Revolution: in recent days, 15 former and current student activists have been arrested throughout Iran.

1030 GMT: Ahmadi's Nuke Gambit. Finally, some white smoke from the Islamic Republic News Agency, which runs a supportive article for the President's proposal to swap Iran's uranium abroad. An "unnamed senior diplomat" explains that the initiative shows Iran's "flexibility" in negotiations on the issue.

0945 GMT: An EA source from Iran reports that Omid Mehregan, a translator and intellectual in Tehran, was arrested last night. Soon after the election, Mehregan and Morad Fardhadpour wrote for the British periodical Red Pepper: "Misguided western leftists may have their doubts about the Iranian mass movement against President Ahmadinejad’s disputed election ‘victory’. They should put them aside in the face of the new politics of revolt."

0905 GMT: Student activist Maziar Samiee has been arrested.

0900 GMT: On the International Front. We've posted an analysis, from colleagues at Politics3.com, of how Turkey might be able to break the deadlock in nuclear talks between the "West" and Iran.

0800 GMT: Arrests and Sentences. Reporters and Humanrights Activists in Iran is providing regular updates, such as the four-year prison term for author and literary journalist Javad Maherzadeh.

0735 GMT: We've posted an article --- half in fun, half in academic horror --- at a mass e-mail and five-month-old (dubious) poll passing itself off as confirmation of the current legitimacy of the Iran Government.

(I might have let this go without comment --- why give more publicity to poor analysis? However, I noticed last night that Joshua Holland of AlterNet, a blogger whom I respect very much, subsequently wrote, "Polls Suggest Everything You Think You Know About Iran’s 'Tainted' Election Is Wrong".

I should add that Holland was on an advance press list, rather than a generic list of recipients, for the material on the polls and that he has interviewed the polling group on several occasions, for example, over their work in Iraq. Still, my worry was that a very shaky exercise would be refreshed as confirmation that the Ahmadinejad Government is on solid ground and faces little resistance.)

0600 GMT: It did not bring as much attention outside Iran as Mir Hossein Mousavi's statement on Tuesday or President Ahmadinejad's declaration of a shift in Tehran's position on its nuclear programme. Mehdi Karroubi certainly did not prompt the fevered reactions to his comments of the previous week, but make no mistake: his proclamation on Wednesday on the protest of 22 Bahman as a necessary if calm response to the abuses of the Government was the event of the day. It consolidated the latest rhetoric from leading opposition politicians and clerics, as The Los Angeles Times --- which, to its credit, was the US newspaper that recognised the declaration's importance --- signalled in this lengthy extract:

We are approaching the anniversary of the Islamic Revolution at a time when both the Islamism and republicanism of the regime have been seriously questioned. The 10th presidential election was tainted with fraud. Peaceful protests were met with violence and suppression, and finally the walls of trust between people and the establishment collapsed.

People's demands have to be taken seriously into account. Repression, mass detention of political activists, journalists and students, show trials, execution and heavy punishments and security crackdowns cannot contain the prevailing crisis.

Those in power should reconsider their methods, and keep in mind that neither silence nor retreat on our part, nor threats, intimidation and violence on their part, can resolve the problems.

The authorities take no step in favor of the people and give childish and bizarre images of the current bitter realities.

State corruption and discrimination are rife in the country. The leaders are incapable of dealing with simple domestic affairs, but they claim to be able to run the world.

Rigid-minded hard-liners continue to utter baseless accusations against the pillars of the regime and the faithful confidants of the late imam [Ayatollah Khomeini].

All articles of the constitution have to be fully implemented. All political prisoners have to be released unconditionally. Press restrictions have to be scrapped and criticism should be tolerated. The current climate of intimidation and fear has to change. These are the demands of the opposition movement.

In contrast, the regime --- while noting that it still has the far-from-minor weapon of sweeping up activists and putting them in prison, as it continued to do on Wednesday --- was caught up in another spate of indecision. After the posturing of the rocket launch yesterday morning, officials had to figure out what to do next with President Ahmadinejad's announcement, backed up by his Foreign Minister, that Iran would allow a "swap" of uranium stock outside the country to ensure 20% uranium for its civilian reactors.

The head of Iran's Atomic Energy Organization, Ali Akbar Salehi, tried to hold the line, "The discussions are still being conducted, and we will inform the nation of any final agreements," in the face of questions. Pressed who might host the "third-party enrichment", "he cited an Asian country, but would not specify which one". (Answer: it's Turkey.)

Further evidence that Ahmadinejad had spoken loudly but now had to back up the words by getting agreement from those within the regime came from Press TV, which could merely report last night, "The West has urged Iran to submit a formal offer to the UN nuclear watchdog after the Iranian president said his government was ready to negotiate over a fuel swap deal."

Iran Analysis: How Turkey Can Break the Nuclear Stalemate

Colette Mazzucelli and Sebnem Udum write for Politics3.com:

The proliferation of nuclear weapons among failing states and fundamentalist non-state actors is the immediate challenge of the decade in national and international security. In Iran, however, the elections of June 12, 2009 illustrate to the world the increasing futility of a narrow focus on proliferation at the expense of the larger picture—the evolution of what Ali Ansari identifies as “a particular idea of power” in the regime.

The threats to the Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) are much broader than Iran’s nuclear ambitions. Those who argue that Iranian goals are limited to a civilian nuclear program designed to address urgent domestic needs must increasingly confront Iran’s complicated internal power struggle, which is more fragmented each day. Indeed, domestic cleavages and elite factionalization have characterized Iranian politics since the 1979 Revolution. What has emerged more recently, however, as the contestation since the summer makes clearer, is that divisions within the Revolutionary Guards—the element of Iran’s military established after the Revolution of 1979—complicate internal policy making.

This development is particularly dangerous on the nuclear issue and further delimits the ability of other states, even those with strong regional and Muslim ties like Turkey, to mediate on a range of policies. And mediation is essential if Iran is to play a constructive role commensurate with its growing influence in the Middle East.


Domestic Cleavages and a Fragmental Elite

Ansari explains how the changes internal to the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps made their co-optation by conservative elements within the Iranian government possible given the rise of the second generation Right in the 1990s. Over time, these changes strengthened the hand of a conservative leadership threatened by the reformers led by Khatami, who was elected president in 1997. Both the Revolutionary Guard and the Basij, a volunteer militia founded by the order of the Supreme Leader Ayatollah Khomeini in 1979, gradually became, in [Ali] Ansari’s words, “guardians, not so much of the revolution, but of a particularly hard-line interpretation of that revolution personified by the supreme leader.”

Of significance for those who must deal with elite leadership in Iran is the way in which the Guards were increasingly dominated by men loyal, above all, to the doctrine of velayat-e faqih. In the Shia Muslim religion Iranians practice, this doctrine asserts the population’s submission in all matters to the authority of one man, the Supreme Jurist, Ayatollah Khamenei. Velayat-e faqih, or the guardianship of the jurist, is the legal foundation of the Constitution of 1979, and the source of the supreme leader’s authority. İt is this foundation that places the current supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, in a relatively strong institutional position, despite his open, and contested, support of Ahmadinejad as president.

Iran’s domestic crisis is so intricate as to defy scholars’ ability to explain recent events. We may well ask if this is a crisis of an elite increasingly fractured, as Ansari explains, by its blatant pursuit of materialism. The tipping point is that the wealth acquired by the few can only be gained at the expense of the many, who suffer daily the loss of security, the loss of ideals for which the 1979 Revolution was fought and the loss of a future for the country’s youth. Machiavelli’s realism, which the scholar Michael Doyle explains as integral to fundamentalism, is only a starting point for interpreting the complex nature of individual and fragmented elite leadership within the Guards, its pervasive ambitions within the structure of government and society, and the many ways its influence is felt in an oppressive and dangerous regime decades after a revolution that, in Ansari’s reading, is open to “mercantilization".

Ahmadinejad’s election victory in 2005 may be situated in the context of various segments of the Iranian society, particularly among those Hamid Dabashi identifies in his volume, Iran A People Interrupted, as “the most disappointed, the most disenfranchised and the most impoverished” whose hopes were invested in the Revolution of 1979. His opponent, Ali Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani, was one of the founders of the Islamic Republican Party, which was established to advocate an unrestricted theocracy. Rafsanjani, like numerous contemporary leaders within the protest movement, supports the regime created by the Revolution, starting with the doctrine of velayat-e faqih.

Further, the protest movement continues to illustrate Iran’s evolving demographics in which those under thirty years of age constitute almost 70 percent of the population. It is from that segment of educated and technologically savvy youth, and the experiences of the current protests, that new leadership is likely to emerge. Indeed, leaders are made from the crises of their time. And while the brutality of a narrow elite may succeed in suppressing most of the leadership that could emerge in the present context, it will not stop generational change, which includes the most disenfranchised in the Iranian society. This generation has the authority, borne of its own disillusionment with the failed promises of revolution, to create an obstacle from within, thereby countering the popular dictatorship, which President Ahmadinejad and the genuine power behind his incumbent position—the Ayatollah—increasingly embody for a growing number of protesters.

Nevertheless, attempts from outside Iran to alter the pace or course of change are likely to fail, given the dated narratives that have already created too much history, particularly between Iran and the United States—more specifically during the overthrow of Mossadeq in 1953 and the taking of hostages at the American Embassy in Iran during the 1979 Revolution. Along those lines, Ansari reveals that the Guards are “empowered by a war mythology, reinforced by a largely constructed fear of foreign subversion and given free reign by the Ahmadinejad administration” to indulge in an “extensive extortion racket,” which he defines as one of the realities of the “mafia state” Iran has become.

So what do these developments portend for a people who must develop in their own time and space within an increasingly complex regional and global environment? For now, only time will tell whether a national collective will remains united behind Ahmadinejad’s nuclear rhetoric and more specifically, a regime that persists in shifting the blame for economic stagnation and human rights abuses to those who foment a “velvet revolution” from beyond its borders.

In this context, direct engagement by the United States, Turkey or the P5 + 1 is difficult at best. If the deepening crisis of the regime perpetuates elite paranoia as economic stagnation worsens, the government’s traditional recourse to foreign policy and a nationalist rallying point, such as a nuclear crisis, is destined to confront an Iranian society less inclined to listen to the elite message. It is the timing of engagement by the Obama administration that is critical. Even though the road to sanctions complicates the broader U.S.-Iran relationship, we must consider the current government’s ability and inclination to deliver credibly on an international nuclear agreement. The brutality of the regime against its own, and the uncertainty about Iran’s capacity at present to negotiate in good faith, suggests a waiting game. So while the Obama administration has shown its willingness to engage, the ball is in Iran’s court.

Moreover, to be successful, sanctions must directly target the vast financial assets of the Revolutionary Guards and require the continual assent of China and Russia. Sanctions must also be perceived by the Iranian protesters as denying the Guards the resources to stifle all opposition to the regime in education and media, as well as politics.

Admittedly, however, it is unclear if sanctions that persistently target the Revolutionary Guards’ material wealth may buy time, as the nuclear clock keeps ticking, given the Guards’ dominance in nuclear thinking, the more blatant factional struggles on questions of nuclear policy and the problems Iranians are encountering to accomplish a “covert breakout” option. On the other hand, military strikes are less credible, particularly for Israel, given Iran’s vast network of tunnels which hide the various uranium enrichment facilities around the country.

What is emerging as a more plausible scenario is that Ahmadinejad will not be able consistently to play a card on the international stage, which he can no longer sell to a domestic audience. Popular contestation is a response in part to the leadership divisions within the Guards, whose older generation does not sanction force against the people.¹⁴ This divisiveness has led to a broadening of those segments in Iranian society, which focus more since June 12 on abuses of state and society in their struggle for voice.

Turkey’s Unique Role

Given the growing complexity of Iran’s nuclear ambitions, American engagement in the P5+1 (China, France, Germany, Russia, the United Kingdom and the United States), as well as the active involvement of Turkey, is the option more likely over the long term to counter proliferation from the inside out. The more immediate action, sanctions against the vested interests of the Guards, would also hurt the Iranian people although this is increasingly a matter of degree. The internal repression of the Guards is worse than the hardship of international sanctions.

Richard Haass argues in Newsweek that working-level negotiations on the nuclear question should continue. In this context, Turkey has genuine interests to play a mediatory role even in the face of resistance from the Republican Guards, as evidenced in the intervention to derail the construction of an international airport in Tehran. Ansari highlights that the airport project, which was being constructed with the involvement of Turkish partners, initially excluded the Guards who promptly acted out of material (not national security) interests and delayed its opening to travellers for months.

In addition, Turkey has other unique characteristics which may provide a lucrative starting point in furthering nuclear negotiations with Iran. First, Turkey pursued a policy of indifference towards the Middle East during the Cold War, and enjoyed stability in its Iranian border since the seventeenth century. Additionally, the rough military and strategic balance between Turkey and Iran has successfully prevented a hot war between the two countries.

Since 2002, when the concerns increased about Iran’s nuclear program and various options were put on the table to deal with it, Turkey has walked a tightrope. Its strategic relations with the United States and the course they went through in the pre-Iraq War period taught Ankara that it would not be alone in responding to security issues in its region. And while Turkey is concerned about the possibility of a nuclear Iran, it also wants to avoid being the target of retaliation should it cooperate with the United States, particularly for military measures against Iran.

In this context, Ankara favors diplomacy over other options. Indeed, Turkey’s geographical and political position between the East and the West is promising for a facilitating role in the negotiation process with Iran. That said, Ankara could play a meaningful role in breaking off the negative perceptions that hinder progress, and in building new ones that would make maintaining the non-nuclear-weapon status the “rational choice.”

Turkey views nuclear proliferation as a consequence rather than a cause of insecurity. It acknowledges the threats and risks of further proliferation in its region and beyond, and has been a committed member of international regimes on non-proliferation of weapons of mass destruction.¹⁷ Ankara has plans to harness nuclear technology for electricity generation, and would be adversely affected by proliferation trends in the region. Additionally, its ties with the Middle East (historical and cultural) and the West, particularly its strategic relations with the United States and the accession process to the European Union, grant Turkey with the ability to “speak both languages.” More importantly, it is one of the countries that would incur the negative impact should negotiations with Iran fail and proliferation trends rise in the region. In sum, Turkey is fit to play an active role in negotiations and it is willing to do so.

The Trust Issue

While there have been several proposals to keep Tehran’s capabilities under control, the main issue that prevents effective cooperation is the lack of trust between the international community and Iran, a reality that reveals itself in the demands for more transparency¹⁸ and “equality” respectively. The international community, most notably the United States, is concerned about the possibility of a nuclear Iran, and believes that unless its nuclear program is completely transparent, (i.e. when Tehran ratifies the Additional Protocol) Iran could divert its enrichment capability to produce a sufficient amount of highly enriched uranium (HEU), which could be used to manufacture an atomic bomb. Tehran’s advances in ballistic missile capability only increase these concerns.

Hence, ratification of the Additional Protocol also has a symbolic meaning that denotes commitment to non-proliferation norms, and Iran’s reluctance to do so emboldens mistrust regarding its nuclear program. More importantly, the possibility of a nuclear Iran could stimulate proliferation in the region, hence instability. Such a trend would challenge the nuclear non-proliferation regime as other non-nuclear-weapon states would start questioning the effectiveness of the regime and the meaning of their status as a security asset.

Finally, as discussed, Iran does not trust extra-regional powers, particularly the United States. The experiences of 1953 and 1979 taught Iran that sovereignty is non-negotiable, and self-sufficiency is the primary asset for security. Therefore, it argues that it cannot be denied its “indisputable and legitimate right” to have and operate complete nuclear fuel-cycle, and believes that doing so would diminish its power both materially and ideationally.

In this context, mutual understanding of key concepts is integral throughout the negotiation process, because they have the power to mitigate the inherent lack of trust from all sides. Some of these concepts are cooperation, transparency, sovereignty and non-proliferation. Along those lines, Iran perceives that if it allows enhanced verification inspections of the IAEA, and halts its uranium enrichment program, it would mean unequal treatment and loss of power because this would compromise self-sufficiency and sovereignty. Iran also argues that the lack of focus on other nuclear states in the region is a double-standard if the real goal is non-proliferation.

The international community, on the other hand, interprets Iran’s reluctance to take steps as a tactic to buy time, and the more they diverge from cooperation, the more Iran becomes a threat to international security. To alleviate these discrepancies, a viable channel must be designed to communicate all of these concepts to both sides, and to overcome the cultural bulwarks that have been underestimated in the negotiation process. Ankara has the potential for such communication, particularly with its new foreign policy perspective that is based on cooperative security.

Iran Snap Analysis: "Game-Changers" from Mousavi and Ahmadinejad

UPDATE 0905 GMT: We have now posted the full English translation of Mousavi's statement.

UPDATE 0900 GMT: An intervention from an EA reader: "Mousavi 'had been accused of being too reticent, cautious, and even compromising toward the regime at the end of 2009' almost exclusively by Iranians abroad. Almost unanimously, those inside Iran have understood the game he is been playing and the domestic rules under which he's had to operate."

In sports, a "game-changer" is a play by an individual that changes the course of a match: a 30-yard (27-metre, if you must) strike in football, a three-point play in basketball, a crushing hit in ice hockey.

Well, both Mir Hossein Mousavi and Mahmoud Ahmadinejad tried to become game-changers on Tuesday. Mousavi's statement on his website Kalemeh, given in the form of answers to questions, was one meant to build up strength throughout the day. That it did --- it received prominent and, in most cases, accurate coverage in almost every media outlet, and the message was clear: a politician who had been accused of being too reticent, cautious, and even compromising toward the regime at the end of 2009 was now standing tough. More importantly, he was calling on the Green movement protesters to take to the streets --- within the law, but loudly and forcefully --- to challenge a Government of "dictatorship" and "tyranny".

Iran Special: Full Text of Mousavi Declaration for 22 Bahman (2 February)
Iran Document: The Rallying Call of Mousavi’s 14 Points (2 February)
The Latest From Iran (3 February): Picking Up the Pace
The Latest from Iran (2 February): A Quiet Start to An Unquiet Day

Ahmadinejad's move will release less notice amongst opposition activists. We poked fun at a "Fox News military analyst" yesterday who said the President might test a nuclear device on 22 Bahman, the anniversary of the Revolution. We did not know that he would try something far different. With his offer last night to send Iran's 3.5-percent uranium outside the country in exchange for 20-percent stock, the President was reversing a line that had been maintained for months. Iran would no longer inside that a swap had to take place inside its borders.



That is a major shift, and it remains to be seen why Ahmadinejad made his move (and note that he made it in a hastily-called interview on national television), as well as signalling that there was talks about trading three US detainees for Iranian prisoners held abroad. The immediate speculation would be that there have been behind-the-scenes talks with brokers such as Turkey; the International Atomic Energy Agency and the US had both signalled in recent days that a deal was still on the table. At the same time, although the President is staying clear of the internal crisis in his public comments and actions, I have to wonder if he has also made this unexpected move to try and grab some "legitimacy" before 11 February.

Now, however, Ahmadinejad may have renewed the fight, but with "conservatives" within the establishment. It was the challenge of high-profile politicians like Ali Larijani that derailed the President's autumn efforts at a nuclear deal to shore up his position. So keep eyes wide open as to how Larijani and his Parliamentary allies react and even if the Supreme Leader offers any signals.

Eight days to 22 Bahman.

The Latest from Iran (2 February): A Quiet Start to An Unquiet Day

2150 GMT: A Final Note. We'll know more tomorrow, after Iranian state media kicks into high gear, but the Ahmadinejad statement on the nuclear talks --- which had effectively gone into the freezer --- could be big. All of a sudden, the move of Iran's uranium stock outside the country is A-OK: "If we allow them to take it, there is no problem. We sign a contract to give 3.5 percent enriched uranium and receive 20 percent enriched one after four or five months."

But --- and watch this, because it will probably be missed by Western media more concerned with the West-Iran dynamic --- Ahmadinejad may have re-opened a fight with Iran's "conservatives" over his nuclear strategy. As the Associated Press notes, "He dismissed concerns by what he called 'colleagues' that the West would not return the uranium."

More tomorrow.....

NEW Iran Document: The Rallying Call of Mousavi’s 14 Points (2 February)
NEW Iran Letter: Journalist Emadeddin Baghi in Prison
NEW Iran Document: Khatami Statement on Rights and Protests (1 February)
Latest Iran Video: Sunday Boxing – French Police v. Iranian Ambassador (31 January)
Iran Football Special: Green Movement Shoots! It Scores!
NEW Latest Iran Video: Foreign Minister Mottaki on Elections & Protests (31 January)
The Latest from Iran (1 February): The Anniversary Begins

2135 GMT: Hamlet and 22 Bahman. Let's close tonight on a high literary note.

Rah-e-Sabz, unsurprisingly, is jabbing away at the Government. For example, it is claiming that the Revolutionary Court has stepped back in its latest bulletin by not connecting the two executions last week to the post-election demonstrations. However, its cheekiest story is a summary of Seyed Hassan Khomeini's supposed comments as he cold-shouldered President Ahmadinejad yesterday: "To be or not to be a protester, that is the question."

2130 GMT: Another release. Journalist Mostafa Izadi, arrested on Ashura, has been freed after 34 days in solitary confinement.

2105 GMT: Missing the Point. Almost all Western media have picked up on one of today's big events, the statement of Mir Hossein Mousavi. Unfortunately, not all have realised the significance of Mousavi's resolute call to arms against the Government of "dictatorship and tyranny" for the rallies on 22 Bahman. The Associated Press mis-reads, and The Washington Post prints the mis-reading without question:

Iran's opposition leader appealed to his supporters and other anti-government activists Tuesday not to overstep the law in pressing for political and social changes....His comments also expose the range of separate and sometimes conflicting aims within the opposition camp.

2100 GMT: Protests and Releases. For the fourth night in a row, hundreds have gathered in front of Evin Prison, and for the fourth night, detainees have been freed. About 20 joined the crowd this evening.

2050 GMT: Correction. Big Correction. That's not just an Ahmadinejad posture (2020 GMT) over the nuclear talks. It appears to be a concession: according to Reuters, the President said, "We have no problem sending our enriched uranium abroad."

2040 GMT: More Invites to the Rally. The reformist Association of Combatant Clergy, calling for an acceptance of people's rule, has asked Iranians to take to the streets on 22 Bahman.

2020 GMT: Where's Mahmoud? Well, it appears that, while Iran heats up, President Ahmadinejad is still playing the international field. First, he used a meeting with the Qatari Crown Prince to strike a pose, “The Westerners cannot bear the thought of security and solidarity among regional countries. They have survived largely by sowing discord and inciting instability in the region.”

Then, perhaps more significantly, Ahmadinejad used an interview on national television tonight to keep open the prospect of a deal on Iran's nuclear programme, offering assurances that a "swap" of 20% uranium for Iran's 3.5% stock inside the country "would be properly and fully implemented".

Ahmadinejad also said that there were discussions for a swap of jailed Iranians for three US citizens detained in August after crossing into Iran from northern Iraq.

2010 GMT: Clerical Challenge. Grand Ayatollah Bayat-Zanjani, meeting members of the Islamic Association of Students at Tehran University, has criticised those who “introduce their false interpretation as the religion while seeking a specific political goal”, pointedly turning the regime's charges of "mohareb" against it: “The enemy of God (mohareb) is the one who kills and butchers people, not the protester with empty hands.”

Bayat Zanjani continued, “In the Islamic Republic we say one with a question is free to ask his/her question, he/she should not be called an Enemy of God over a question, criticism, or even protest.” However, “those who use the public podiums for terrorising, threatening, and unfortunately a platform for giving untrue and self-established definitions of the Shia’s teachings, are far from the religion of Mohammad (the Prophet) and Ali (the first Imam of Shi'a) and all they do is to feed their false interpretations to the public.”

1830 GMT: Arrests (cont.). It is reported that Ali Mohammad Eslampour, journalist and chief editor of Navay-e Vaght in Kermanshah, has been arrested.

1720 GMT: Arrests. Rah-e-Sabz reports that four members of Tehran University's Islamic Students Association have been arrested. We published three of the names earlier today (1320 GMT).

1715 GMT: Thanks to an EA correspondent, we're posting the 14 headline points of today's statement by Mir Hossein Mousavi.

1645 GMT: As an EA reader has noted in comments, the website Radio Zameneh is back on-line after a recent cyber-attack.

1637 GMT: You Know the EA All Is Well Trophy Video, Right? Well, today's winner is the Supreme Leader, who tells a group of Tehran University professors: "I'm optimistic. Recent bitter events were the result of ignorance."

1633 GMT: On the Plus Side. We're still waiting for the English translation of the Mousavi statement, but it is now getting attention in newspapers such as The Wall Street Journal and the BBC.

1630 GMT: Journalistic Idiocy Awards (US Section). It is one of the wonders of American political culture that anyone gives a moment of attention to Daniel Pipes. (I could explain why, but this would take me beyond professional decency.)

So here's a moment of attention to Pipes' latest wisdom before running away: "How to Save the Obama Presidency: Bomb Iran".

1620 GMT: Journalistic Idiocy Awards (Iran Section). Javan, the newspaper linked to the Revolutionary Guard, claims that the opposition is paying $100 to people to protest on 11 February.

1340 GMT: Worst Prediction for 22 Bahman. Retired US Navy Captain and "Fox News military analyst" Chuck Nash says, with a straight face, that President Ahmadinejad may test a nuclear device on 11 February.

1335 GMT: Interesting Clues in the "West". Lindsay Hilsum, of Britain's Channel 4, offers some interesting teasers on US and European policy from a gathering at Chatham House in London:

Last night, I went to a discussion on Iran. “Chatham House rules” mean I can’t quote anyone who was there, but the highlights are worth noting.

Someone who is well in with the Obama administration told us that when the president started his “hand outstretched” policy towards Iran it was “100 per cent about the nuclear and external policy and zero per cent about Iran’s internal issues.”

After 12 June, and the turbulent post-election crisis, there’s been some recalibration – he’d now put it at 70/30....

Another [source] (close to a European government) said: “We must ensure we do no harm. This is not our moment, and not our movement. But we must ensure the opposition is not subjugated to the nuclear issue or business interests.”

1330 GMT: Slowing Down the Net. I'll leave others to speculate on significance of this report: Internet traffic for some servers in Iran has ceased; for others it is reduced.

1320 GMT: Arrests and Sentences. Reports --- student activists Vahid Abedini, Navid Abedini, and Esmail Izadi have been detained after their houses were raided. Journalist Niloofar Laripour has been arrested after being summoned to the Ministry of Intelligence.

Journalist Keyvan Samimi has been sentenced to six years in prison, with a lifetime ban on political activity.

1315 GMT: We're Going to Get You, Hashemi. That threat against Hashemi Rafsanjani, sending the files of his children to court (see 0945 GMT)? It came from the same man who declared today We Will Kill the Detainees (1025 GMT), deputy head of Iran's judiciary, Ebrahim Raeesi.

1310 GMT: It is reported that the second court session for the 16 Ashura protesters, whose trial began on Saturday, will be held Wednesday. Five of the defendants, including two women, are charged with "mohareb" (war against God).

1025 GMT: Battling over Executions. Hours after the head of Iran's judiciary, Sadegh Larijani, said he would not be pushed by "hard-liners" into quicker executions and would follow the legal process, his deputy has reportedly assured, We're Going to Kill Them.

Fars quotes Ebrahim Raeesi in a meeting in Qom, "The two people executed (Mohammad Reza Ali Zamani and Arash Rahmanipour) and another nine who will soon be executed were definitely arrested in recent riots and each was linked with counter-revolutionary movements. They had participated in riots with the aim of creating disunity and toppling the system."

1020 GMT: Mohammad Ali Rafi'i, a member of political department of the Islamic Students Organization, has reportedly been abducted when leaving Tehran University. Peyke Iran also claims pressure on detained students to confess on television.

0945 GMT: Pressuring Rafsanjani. It appears the regime just does not trust Hashemi Rafsanjani enough to let him be: files on the investigation of his children, including Mehdi Hashemi, have been presented to a Tehran court.

(There is a hot Internet rumour that at least one of Rafsanjani's children will be marching on 22 Bahman. Rafsanjani's daughter, Faezeh Hashemi, has been involved in demonstrations since June.)

0940 GMT: Kayhan London (not to be confused with the "hard-line" Kayhan in Tehran) has now come out behind the leadership of the Green movement, while stressing it contains other political currents, and defended Mir Hossein Moussavi and Mehdi Karroubi against the attacks of those who condemn them of loyalty to the Islamic Republic.

0935 GMT: Ruining the Revolution. Agence France Presse and Reuters have both picked up on Mir Hossein Mousavi's declaration (see 0710 GMT), and it loses none of its force in translation. Mousavi claims the goals of the 1979 Revolution have not been fulfilled because the "roots of tyranny and dictatorship" still exist; Mousavi no longer believes "that the revolution had removed all those structures which could lead to totalitarianism and dictatorship":

Today, one can identify both elements and foundations which produce dictatorship as well as resistance against returning to this dictatorship Stifling the media, filling the prisons and brutally killing people who peacefully demand their rights in the streets indicate the roots of tyranny and dictatorship remain from the monarchist era... I don't believe that the revolution achieved its goals.

0825 GMT: Yahoo Keeps Mowj-e-Sabz Off-Line? In December, Mowj-e-Sabz, the key Green movement website, was knocked off-line by a cyber-attack. Those behind the site said at the time that they were suspending operations but intended to resume their journalism.

This now in from blogger Ethan Zuckerman:

I’ve been in regular contact with the administrators of Mowjcamp as they’ve tried to regain control of their site. For six weeks, they’ve been getting the runaround from Yahoo! (where they’d originally registered the domain names) and Moniker (where the hackers moved control of the domain name). Yahoo has been informed that the site was illegally moved by hackers who managed to access a Yahoo Mail account and authorize a transfer to Moniker – they’ve told the site administrators that there’s nothing they can do, and the problem’s in Moniker’s hands. Moniker, in turn, tells the administrators that they’ve responded to Yahoo, which will resolve their problem. In the meantime, the site continues to be inaccessible from the URLs by which it is most widely known.

0805 GMT: With the help of EA readers, we have posted an English translation of a letter we have received from Tehran, "Journalist Emadeddin Baghi in Prison".

0745 GMT: "A New Kind of Revolution". Setareh Sabety in Iranian.com:

[This] is the first revolution that does not need leadership nor ideology because it is fueled by a basic, unrelenting need for freedom and justice that is so strong it is self-correcting and self-propelling! This is not just a civil rights movement; this is not merely a reform movement. This is a new kind of Revolution.

0710 GMT: Quiet No Longer. Today's first big move has come from Mir Hossein Mousavi, answering 10 questions on his website Kalemeh. Among his forthright declarations: "We have lost complete hope in the judiciary system"; "Resistance to dictatorship is the precious heritage of the Islamic Revolution"; "People have always wanted justice; the demand for freedom is born of human thought".

0705 GMT: On the Economic Front. Iran's oil and gas revenue fell more than 45 percent in the first half of the current Iranian year (March-September 2009) compared to the same period in 2008.

0700 GMT: Looking for the Positive. About 1000 family members of detainees and supporters gathered again in front of Evin Prison last night. Almost 30 prisoners were reportedly released.

Amongst those freed was Ayatollah Mohammad Taghi Khalaji, released on bail after his detention last month.

0650 GMT: And Those Who Have Been "Disappeared". Photographer Mehraneh Atashi and her husband Madjid Ghaffari were arrested on 12 January and detained, apparently in solitary confinement in ward 209 of Evin Prison. Authorities have released no information about charges against them. They have had no access to a lawyer, no visits from their family, and no contact apart from a brief telephone call to say they had been arrested.

The International Campaign for Human Rights in Iran has raised the situation of Atashi and Ghaffari as a case typical of "hundreds" of Iranians in the post-election conflict.

0640 GMT: The Detentions. Fereshteh Ghazi complements our morning analysis of "threats and arrests" with a summary of the current situation of political prisoners, focusing on the attempt to break advisors to Mir Hossein Mousavi.

0630 GMT: Three prominent Iranian authors have been arrested: Reza Khandan, Omid Montazeri, and Alireza Saqafi.

0620 GMT: So the big news from the 1st day of the commemorations of the 1979 Islamic Revolution? There was no big news.

Perhaps the most notable development was former President Mohammad Khatami joining the calls, albeit implicitly, for people to rally on 22 Bahman on 11 February (see separate entry). On the regime side, however, there were no big declarations, no mass gatherings, merely a rather muted ceremony at Behesht-e-Zahra cemetery and President Ahmadinejad's strained appearance at the Khomeini memorial.

Government actions were more of the "negative" kind, with scattered threats and arrests. The strategy of trying to wipe out public protests continues, but even that appears to be filled with tension as the big day approaches.

22 Bahman is a week on Thursday.