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Entries in Masih Alinejad (3)

Monday
Jun142010

Iran: The Attack on Montazeri, Sane'i, Karroubi

UPDATE 1730 GMT: Journalist Masih Alijenad reports that the home of Sohrab Arabi, who was killed during the 15 June demonstrations, was attacked by plainclothesmen this weekend. Alinejad's revelation comes in an interview with Arabi's mother, activist Parvin Fahimi.



An article in Saham News, the website linked to Mehdi Karroubi --- translated by the Facebook page linked to Mir Hossein Mousavi --- both clarifies and indicates the seriousness of Sunday's harassment of Karroubi, Grand Ayatollah Sane'i, and the family of the late Grand Ayatollah Montazeri. More links and information can be found in our updates for today:

Mehdi Karroubi traveled to the city of Qom to visit Grand Ayatollah Sane'i, a senior reformist figure, at 2:00 PM local time yesterday 13 June. A short time after Mehdi Karroubi arrived at the house of Grand Ayatollah Sane'i, a group of organized thugs gathered in front and started chanting slogans against Karroubi and Sane'i. These plainclothes thugs attacked the car of Mehdi Karroubi with chains and batons and severely damaged it. These individuals, by throwing stones at the house of Grand Ayatollah Sane'i ,vandalized the building. The thugs chanted slogans against Seyyed Hassan Khomeini, grandson of the late Ayatollah Khomeini, the founder of the Islamic Republic, Grand Ayatollah Sane'i, Mehdi Karroubi, and Mir Hossein Mousavi, and in support of the Supreme Leader.

Mehdi Karroubi at 6:30 PM local time, after leaving the house of Grand Ayatollah Sane'i, first went to the house of Ahmad Montazeri, the eldest son of late Grand Ayatollah Montazeri, who was the spiritual leader of the Green Movement, then visited Saeed Montazeri, another son of late Grand Ayatollah Montazeri, and finally went to the house of the late Grand Ayatollah Montazeri. Unfortunately, when Mehdi Karroubi was visiting the family of late Grand Ayatollah Montazeri, these thugs, by attacking and throwing stones to the house of the late Grand Ayatollah, broke the windows and severely vandalized the building.

At 11:30 PM Mehdi Karroubi, because of this mob attack on the house of late Grand Ayatollah Montazeri and the request by the Revolutionary Guards, police, and security forces of the city of Qom moved to the building owned by Revolutionary Guards and next to the house of the later Grand Ayatollah. Finally, with arrangements by the security forces of the city of Qom at 4:00 AM on Monday, 14 June, Karroubi left the Revolutionary Guards’ building and returned to Tehran.

Mehdi Karroubi travelled to the city of Qom yesterday to visit with Grand Ayatollah Saanei and Seyyed Hassan Khomeini.
Wednesday
Jun092010

The Latest from Iran (9 June): Paying Attention

2030 GMT: Political Prisoner Watch. Human Rights Activists News Agency reports that the head of Mir Hossein Mousavi's campaign in Babolsar has been arrested.

2000 GMT: A Friendly Notice. To all journalists riding the two-dimensional bandwagon on Twitter & Iran, treating cliches like "Twitter Revolution" as if they were the core of meaningful analysis, I'm not going to respond for the moment --- this is a made-up dramatic revelation, which recurs every few months and does not get to the heart of what social media has meant in the post-election crisis. Best to let it serve as tomorrow's chip paper.

But if you keep it up, I may change my mind....

1900 GMT: Mahmoud Snaps Back. President Ahmadinejad, who has had post-election encounters with dust (read his "victory speech") and insects (see video), worked both into his response to the UN sanctions resolution: "These (U.N.) resolutions have no value...They are like a used handkerchief that should be thrown in the dust bin. Sanctions are falling on us from the left and the right. For us they are the same as pesky flies....We have patience and we will endure throughout all of this."

NEW Latest Iran Video: Obama Statement on Sanctions...and Rights (9 June)
NEW Iran Analysis: What’s Most Important Today? (Hint: Not Sanctions)
NEW Iran Analysis: 4 June “The Day the Regime Will Regret” (Verde)
Iran Election Anniversary Special: The Power of the “Gradual”
Iran Special Report:The Attack on Civil Society (Arseh Sevom)
The Latest from Iran (8 June): Tremors and Falsehoods


1855 GMT: Back to 22 Khordaad. BBC Persian reports on the increased security presence on the streets of Tehran on the eve of 12 June,the anniversary of the election.


1725 GMT: President Obama has just made a statement about Iran in the aftermath of the UN vote on sanctions. We've posted the video.

Here's the quick read: Obama proclaimed that the sanctions were the "most comprehensive" Iran has faced, said that the UN resolution sent an "unmistakeable message", and spent most of the rest of the time justifying the position on sanctions in connection with his policy of "engagement": "We recognize Iran's rights, but with those rights come responsibilities. Time and again the Iranian Government has failed to meet those responsibilities."

Then, in one of the eight minutes of the statement, having declared,"These sanctions are not directed at the Iranian people," Obama switched from nukes to rights. He noted this Saturday's anniversary of the election, "an event that should have been remembered for how the Iranian people participated with remarkable enthusiasm but will instead be remembered for how the Iranian Government brutally suppressed dissent and murdered the innocent, including a young woman [Neda Agha Soltan] left to die in the street".

It was a bit awkward for the President to link back to uranium and sanctions, and he did not help by throwing in the spectre of Tehran's War of Terror --- "Actions do have consequences. And today the Iranian Government will face some of those consequences. Because whether it is threatening the Nuclear Non-Proliferation regime or the rights of its own citizens or the stability of its own neighbors by supporting terrorism, the Iranian Government continues to demonstrate that its unjust actions are a threat to justice everywhere".

However, at least for one moment, "Iran" was seen in more than the one-dimensional image of a nuclear weapon.

1720 GMT: Rafsanjani Watch. Former President Hashemi Rafsanjani's office has released a letter which, in the eyes of Deutsche Welle, criticises the Supreme Leader's silence over President Ahmadinejad and implicitly acknowledges fraud in the 2009 election.

1620 GMT: Sanctions. The UN Security Council has voted 12-2, with 1 abstention, for new sanctions against Iran over its nuclear programme.

The relatively limited measures include restrictions on transactions with Iranian banks, asset freezes on Iranian individuals and companies, and an expanded arms embargo on items such as attack helicopters and missiles.

Turkey and Brazil, who recently signed an agreement with Iran on procedure for talks over uranium enrichment, were the two countries who voted against the resolution. Lebanon abstained.

1605 GMT: Karroubi Watch. Al Arabiya has just published an interview from May with Mehdi Karroubi. Topics covered include the rise of the Green Movement, party politics, accusations of prison abuse and torture, Government mismanagement, and Ahmadinejad's foreign policy. Karroubi also offered this in anticipation of 22 Khordaad (12 June), the anniversary of the election:
We promise and give assurances that no incident will occur. I am certain that if a march is held, paramilitary forces will attempt to turn it violent, but our people are wise, and politically mature enough that even if certain individuals come chanting radical slogans, the people have the ability to control the scenario and confront them. However, if authorisation is not granted for demonstrations, we will then decide what to do; but it is currently not possible to say much.

1545 GMT: On the International Front (Mahmoud Stays Home). On Monday, Iranian state media were trumpeting that their internationally-esteemed President would be showing his strength, in the face of Western pressure, by going to the Shanghai Expo in China.

Today, Agence France Presse says that Ahmadinejad plans to stay away from the Shanghai Cooperation Organization meeting to snub Russia and China for supporting the US-backed sanctions resolution in the United Nations.

1120 GMT: Political Prisoner Watch. Amnesty International has launched a new campaign, "One Year On: Stop Unfair Trials". Cases include journalists Abolfazl Abedini Nasr, Hengameh Shahidi, Emaduddin Baghi, Shiva Nazar Ahari and Ahmad Zeidabadi, student activists Majid Tavakoli and Mohammad Amin Valian, and Zia Nabavi of the Council to Defend the Right to Education.

1015 GMT: The Nuclear Discussions. A piece of news that slipped under the media radar....

The International Atomic Energy Agency has announced that it has received replies from France, Russia, and the US to the Iran-Brazil-Turkey declaration on procedure for uranium enrichment talks.

No details were given beyond the note, "Attached to each of the letters was an identical paper entitled ‘Concerns about the Joint Declaration Conveyed by Iran to the IAEA’."

That, however, indicates co-ordination between the three governments. And the timing of the IAEA's statement, together with the lack of substance, indicates that it is happy to let the news be overtaken by today's sanctions vote in the UN.

0955 GMT: Reflecting on The Year. Journalist Masih Alinejad has offered her recollections and analysis in an extended video interview with Voice of America Persian.

0935 GMT: A Signal for the Week? Hamshahri features the colourful cover identifying the bad guys in "Sedition '88".

0930 GMT: Intimidation of Kurdistan Businesses? Human Rights Activists News Agency reports that, following a general strike on 9 May to protest executions, members of bazaars across Kurdistan have been summoned and threatened by government authorities and the businesses of others have been sealed.

0800 GMT: What is the Green Movement? An interesting interview with Fatemeh Sadeghi, a former professor at Tehran University, who argues that the Green Movement is not the opposition of the "secular" against the "religious".

0750 GMT: The Post-Election Abuses. Abdul Ruholamini has resurfaced to declare that those responsible for the abuse and killing of detainees in Kahrizak Prison must "pay for their deeds".

Ruholamini, the campaign manager for Presidential candidate Mohsen Rezaei, is the father of Mohsen Ruholamini, who died in Kahrizak last summer. The case was instrumental in bringing the abuses to light and pressing the Supreme Leader to close Kahrizak. Ruholamini had gone farther in public statements at the start of 2010, declaring that high-ranking officials must take responsibility for the crimes, but had been silent in recent months.

Ruholamini may have been prompted to his statement by the news that the trial of 12 people over the Kahrizak case has finished behind closed doors.

0745 GMT: The Events of 4 June. Another perspective, complementing that of EA's Mr Verde, on last Friday's developments at the ceremony for Ayatollah Khomeini comes from Hamid Farokhnia in Tehran Bureau.

Tehran Bureau also features a review by Muhammad Sahimi, "The Green Movement at One Year".

0740 GMT: Parliament v. President (and Supreme Leader). It seems that Ayatollah Khamenei's intervention --- calling for Parliament-Ahmadinejad co-operation and threatening the Majlis with new "oversight" --- may not have been an overwhelming success.

Key MP Ahmad Tavakoli, an ally of Speaker of Parliament Ali Larijani, has commented in Khabar Online that the Constitution is written for people to cooperate, not to fight. So far, so good for the Supreme Leader.

But then Tavakoli re-asserts, "The Government has no right not to implement the laws from the Majlis."

0715 GMT: On a day when "Iran news", for most non-Iranian media, may be dominated by the passage of the US-led sanctions resolution in the UN Security Council, we set out priorities with two analyses: Scott Lucas declares, "What's Important Today? (Hint: Not Sanctions), and Mr Verde looks at "4 June: A Day the Regime Will Regret".

One US outlet shares our attention to the internal: Newsweek notes last Friday's events, with the shout-down of Seyed Hassan Khomeini, under the (over-blown) headline, "Iran's Hushed-Up Civil War":
For his part, Supreme Leader Khamenei did little damage control, even though he has worked hard to present a united front for Iran’s leadership, knowing that discord suggests vulnerability. He took the stage after Khomeini and asked the crowd to act in a more appropriate manner. But that was it. No defense of Khomeini and no rebuke to the crowd. With the anniversary of the contested election just days away now, Khamenei has been trying to manage a delicate balancing act between quieting and frightening the opposition—and sending mixed messages in the process.

In another warm-up for 12 June, the anniversary of the election, Zahra Rahnavard gives an interview to the Italian paper La Republicca. Beyond general criticism of the Government and the declaration, "I hope to shed the last drop of my blood in the cause of freedom and democracy," she focuses on key issues:
The demands of the women in Iran are twofold: 1) National demands such as freedom, democracy, the rule of the law, freedom of political prisoners, right to individual freedoms; 2) Elimination of discrimination and strengthening of cultural rights, women's rights and equal rights under the law.

....Democracy is not possible without women and without paying attention to the demands of women.
Sunday
Jun062010

The Latest from Iran (6 June): The Fallout from Friday

2150 GMT: More on That Rumour. We've checked with correspondents, who assess that the claim that Seyed Hassan Khomeini hit Minister of Interior, Mostafa Mohammad Najjar, should be treated as "flimsy". They can find no corroborating evidence for the story from Javan.

(We should have noted in the post below that Javan is connected to the Revolutionary Guard, and it could be in its interest to portray the opposition --- and Hassan Khomeini --- as violent and irrational. My apologies for the omission, and my thanks to readers for pointing this out.)

1955 GMT: And Now The Rumour of the Day. Javan reports that the Interior Minister, Mostafa Mohammad Najjar, is currently in hospital after being hit by Seyed Hassan Khomeini, the  grandson of Ayatollah Khomeini, during Friday's ceremony.

According to "multiple sources", Hassan was upset that in a TV interview last week, Najjar referred to him as "Seyed Hassan Mostafavi" --- a "secondary" surname of the Khomeini clan --- to minimise his ties with his grandfather. (Javan also refers to Hassan as "Hassan Mostafavi".)

Najjar already had stitches on his face when he arrived at the Khomeini shrine on Friday, due to surgery for sinusitis. His face was bloody again after being hit by Hassan.

NEW Iran Document: Mehdi Karroubi on Khomeini, the Rule of Law, and Protest in 2010 (4 June)
NEW Iran Document: The Supreme Leader’s Speech (4 June)
Iran Special: The Regime Disappoints, So It’s Over to the Opposition
Iran Document: Detained Filmmaker Nourizad Writes the Supreme Leader
The Latest from Iran (5 June): Is That All There Is?


1625 GMT: Friday Fall-Out. Mehdi Karroubi has written Seyed Hassan Khomeini, “You know very well that the account of these few trained and organized individuals [who shouted down Khomeini during his Friday speech] is separate from the account of the massive number of the devotees of Imam [Khomeini], his children and relatives, and especially you.”


1545 GMT: Reports are coming in that high-profile member of Parliament Ali Motahari has been summoned by his "principlist" party for his criticism of President Ahmadinejad over Friday's events.

1540 GMT: More Fall-Out. Ayatollah Sane'i has phoned Seyed Hassan Khomeini to express his regret over Friday's incident, directing his criticism at authorities: "If they were not politically insane, they would have not prevented the freedom of speech and people’s right to hear the speech in front of hundreds of national and international reporters and while this event was broadcast live. This act is a sign of their weakness and is the sign that the will and desire of God is that their plans would be ruined.”

Sane'i added: “Those how plan these incidents be it those who order it or who execute it or who provoke it are incapable of solving country’s social, economic, political and foreign problems and therefore commit such acts to divert the public mind".

1305 GMT: Friday Fall-Out. Ayatollah Mousavi Ardebili has added his voice to the chorus condemning the sabotage of Seyed Hassan Khomeini's speech at the commemoration ceremony for the death of his grandfather.

1300 GMT: Karroubi Watch. The US magazine Newsweek has published the text of an interview by e-mail with Mehdi Karroubi, which follows the line of the discussion with Masih Alinejad that we posted on EA on 27 May: "My family and myself, we are all ready to pay any price for our struggle for the people of Iran."

1243 GMT: The Executed. The families of Farzad Kamangar,Farhad Vakili, and Ali Heydarian,,three of five Iranians executed on 9 May, have met with the Governor of Kurdestan Province to ask for help in getting the return of their bodies.

The Governor told the families that their children were buried at a place that cannot be disclosed for "security reasons".

1239 GMT: Political Prisoner Watch. Labor activist Alireza Akhavan has been arrested by security forces. Farhad Fathi, the director of the Reformist Organization of Qazvin's International University, has also been detained.

Human Rights Activists News Agency claims Reza Malek, former deputy of Research and Investigation in the Intelligence Ministry, has been severely beaten by prison guards.

1228 GMT: Economy Watch. Iran is 94th out of 104 countries on the 2009 Legatum Prosperity Index, between Cambodia and Kenya.

1224 GMT: We Don't Need No Women's Studies. Hossein Naderi-Manesh, the Deputy Minister of Science and Higher Education, has allegedly said that it is "no problem to eliminate women's studies from universities as the Quran is full of subjects about them".

1220 GMT: Mousavi Challenges Regime on "Foreign Threat". In a statement on Kalemeh, Mir Hossein Mousavi has thrown the allegation of subversion by foreigners and "terrorists" back at the Iranian regime: "It should be asked who has presented a golden opportunity to the US, Israel, the hypocrites, and the monarchists with all these destructive, non-transparent and misleading policies. Is it those who seek freedom and justice or dubious cults which have devastated the lives of laborers, teachers and farmers?"

1119 GMT: Friday Follow-Up. The denunciations of the treatment of Ayatollah Khomeini's grandson, Seyed Hassan Khomeini, are piling up. The reformist Islamic Iran Participation Front, joining politicians from Mir Hossein Mousavi to conservative MP Ali Motahari, has written an open letter to clerics in Qom declaring that Friday's hecklers are against an independent clergy.

1115 GMT: 22 Khordaad. Daneshjoo News carries a call by Green Movement students for demonstrations across Iran on 12 June, the anniversary of the Presidential election.

1045 GMT: Political Prisoner Watch. There is still uncertainty over the supposed 81 pardons handed out by the Supreme Leader. Tehran Prosecutor General Abbas Jafari Doulatabadi said that "a series of prisoners" have already been released, with repentance as a requirement for amnesty. Still, there are no names of those who have supposedly been freed.

0620 GMT: We are in Warwick this morning, so the latest news from Iran will be posted around midday British time.

0610 GMT: Some inside and outside Iran are pondering what they claim is a relatively low turnout for the regime's ceremonies and speeches.

Could one possible reason be a lack of faith in Government? Fazel Mousavi, a member of Parliament's Article 90 Commission, has declared, "In our country, no party in the real meaning of the world, is active."

Reformist Mohammad Reza Khabbaz adds that, in the last year, 122 Government declarations contravened Majlis legislation, "a new record".

0555 GMT: Friday's Controversies. The political thunder rumbles on over the speeches at the ceremony for Ayatollah Khomeini's death. Rah-e-Sabz claims that, by citing Imam Ali, the Supreme Leader has compared himself to Shia's first Imam.

Regime supporter Hojatoleslam Hossein Sobhani-Nia has given indirect approval of the shout-down of the Imam's grandson, Khomeini: "People are alert, when someone deviates from Imam's path."

Meanwhile, some Iranian sites are taking aim at former President Mohammad Khatami, claiming he went to the Caspian Sea for "fun and vacation" while millions were mourning for Ayatollah Khomeini.

0525 GMT: We have posted two documents: there is a key extract from the Supreme Leader's speech on Friday and Mehdi Karroubi's lengthy consideration of "Khomeini, the Rule of Law, and Protest".