The Latest from Iran (13 March): Troublesome Children?
Sunday, March 13, 2011 at 6:49
2140 GMT: Ahmadinejad Watch. Speaking to Iran's governors, President Ahmadinejad has defended his subsidy reduction plan. He said the plan had not yet been fully implements, and people should be careful not to damage it, given the enemy's attempts to undermine the economic initiative.
2120 GMT: Political Prisoner Watch. Journalist Abdolreza Tajik has been sentenced to six years in prison for "membership in illegal groups" and "propaganda".
Student activist Arzhang Alipour has been arrested.
2100 GMT: (Potential) Political Prisoner Watch. Poet Hila Sedighi has been summoned and interrogated by security forces.
2045 GMT: The House Arrests. Prominent reformist Ali Shokouri Rad has confirmed the report (see Saturday's updates and 0640 GMT) that the daughters of Mir Hossein Mousavi and Zahra Rahnavard met their parents on Tuesday, the first contact since Mousavi and Rahnavard were put under strict house arrest a month ago.
2040 GMT: No Fireworks, Please. With the approach Chahrshanbeh Suri, Iran's "Fire Festival", which takes place on Wednesday, a reminder of the Supreme Leader's fatwa fro last year. Ayatollah Khamenei said the celebration, which includes fireworks to bring in the New Year, has no religious basis and causes loss and corruption.
For this year, Hossein Sajedi-Nia, the Tehran police chief, tries a different line, saying that more than 95% of Iranians "have no interest" in the festival.
1545 GMT: The US Hikers. Alireza Avaiee, the head of the Tehran Prosecutor's office, says the second hearing in the trial of US nationals Shane Bauer and Josh Fattal will be on 11 May.
Bauer and Fattal, along with fellow US national Sarah Shourd, were detained while hiking along the Iran-Iraq border in July 2009. Shourd was released on a $500,000 guarantee last September but did not return to Iran for the first hearing in February.
The lawyer for Bauer and Fattal has complained that he has not been able to meet with his clients before or after the hearing and was not able to speak in the court.
1345 GMT: Protection from Fireworks. Mardomak summarises warnings by security forces as Wednesday's Chahrshahbeh Suri, the "Fire Festival", approaches.
0930 GMT: Latest Arrests. State media has announced that adherents to the Baha'i faith have been arrested in southern Iran.
Bam Prosecutor Mohammad-Reza Sanjari claimed the detainees promoted their "perverse beliefs" in kindergartens in Tehran, Kerman, and Bam, disguising these as cultural and educational activities: “The investigations indicated the existence of an extensive network in which these individuals pursued and carried their various programs upon orders from their central [organisation]."
Sanjari said the Baha'i had infiltrated one of Kerman's local magazines and published Baha'i beliefs in the form of children's stories, exploiting "the post-earthquake atmosphere of the city of Bam".
Bam was struck by an earthquake in 2003 which killed more than 26,000 people.
0905 GMT: The Battle Within. More on Saturday's claim of Mohammad Reza Bahonar, the leading principlist MP and Deputy Speaker of Parliament, that the next battle over "sedition" will be within the principlist movement....
Bahonar specifically referred to the contest over the "Iranian school of thought", which has been promoted by the President's Chief of Staff, Esfandiar Rahim-Mashai:
The future sedition is rising. This is the sedition that will come out of principlism and present itself as principlism, but does not accept the seminaries and religion. This great sedition is now in the formative stage. Talking about Iranian school of thought and liberalism when it comes to cultural issues is [the attempt] in this direction.
0855 GMT: Need A Cyber-Job? Revolutionary Guards commander Brigadier General Gholamreza Jalali has said, "We would like to work with those hackers that, with good intentions and revolutionary activity, want to help the Islamic Republic achieve its goals."
At the same time, Jalali warned hackers working against Iran's headquarters of cyber-war is actively pursuing battle with the "enemies".
0745 GMT: Political Prisoner Watch. Human rights activist Shiva Nazar Ahari, has been awarded the Theodor Haecker Award from Germany for honesty and political courage.
Nazar Ahari was imprisoned just after the June 2009 election and again in December 2009. She was released last September on $500,000 bail. Initially she was sentenced to six years in prison and 76 lashes for activities against national security, but this was later reduced to four years and 74 lashes.
As Nazar Ahari is forbidden from leaving Iran, the award will be accepted on her behalf by a colleague, Parisa Kakaei.
0640 GMT: We begin this morning with a look at the younger generation in Iran.
On Saturday night, the daughters of Mir Hossein Mousavi and Zahra Rahnavard explained that they had met their parents, who are under strict house arrest, for the first time in almost a month. Mousavi described the raid on the family home on 14 February, and the daughters noted the presence of numerous agents and a security van in front of the residence. They explained that they had defied the warnings of authorities to speak about the meeting.
Then there is this curiosity, which we initially missed. During his press conference on Tuesday, Tehran Prosecutor General Abbas Jafari Doulatabadi --- explaining the threat from protests even as he denied protests were taking place --- said, "“My suggestion to families is to be careful about the actions of their children because it can no longer be argued that we didn’t know about the nature of the sedition movement.”
We know about troublesome children in the post-election crisis. There are, of course, the children of former President Hashemi Rafsanjani. The son of Abdolhossein Ruholamini, detained for protesting just after the 2009 election, was killed in Kahrizak detention centre. The children of senior clerics and politicians have been arrested.
So to which "families" was Doulatabadi referring with his sedition statement?
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