1750 GMT: It’s All About US and Us. A slowish news phase, so the media are focusing on Ayatollah Khamenei’s Sunday speech. It’s on the lines of the Twitter publicity put out by his office (1330 and 1420 GMT), but this extract is especially provocative:
The enemies wanted to divide the people… and to create a civil war, but the nation was alert. If they were able to do it, the US and Zionist regime would have sent troops to Tehran’s streets, but they knew it would hurt them. Thus they spread propaganda and supported the rioters.
1440 GMT: Parliament v. President. Islamic Republic News Agency is claiming a fight-back against Parliamentary resistance to Ahmadinejad subsidy reform and spending proposals, quoting Arsalan Fathipour, head of the Parliament’s economic commission, “We believe it is not possible to implement the subsidy reform plan at 20,000 billion tomans ($20 billion). So delegates intend to raise the figure to 35-38,000 billion tomans ($35-38 billion).” That would be almost all the $40 billion demanded by the President.
1430 GMT: Obama and Iran. Edward Yeranian of the Voice of America claims that there was a “mized” reception amongst “Iranians inside and outside Iran” of President Obama’s Nowruz message.
A three-minute news clip to note: Al Jazeera English considers the US policy towards Tehran and uses two analysts — Trita Parsi of the National Iranian American Council and Arash Aramesh — to suggest that attention to human rights should take over from a focus on the nuclear programme.
That in itself might not be stunning were it not for context and timing:
1. At Parsi’s NIAC hearing 10 days ago, the panel on US-Iran relations was totally focused on the nuclear issue and a possible “grand settlement” with Iran. There was scarcely a word on rights. Parsi seems to be promoting a policy beyond that “realist” promotion.
2. But it may not just be Parsi; it may be folks inside the US Government. Beyond Barack Obama’s Nowruz message calling on Tehran to accept the rights of its people, there are signs that this might be part of a new policy and not just rhetoric.
Amidst the Nowruz messages inside and outside Iran, Mehdi Karroubi made his contribution yesterday. There was a lot more beside New Year Greetings — Mr Verde analyses:
Karrroubi says that he does not believe in an Islamic Republic which is limited to a few clerics like Ahmadinejad supporters such as Mesbah-Yazdi, Jannati, Shojooni, Hassani, Hosseinian, Ahmad Khatami or an Iran which only includes officials like Ahmadinejad, Mohammad Reza Naqdi, Gholam-Hossein Elham, Saeed Mortazavi, and Jalalladin Farsi (who he says is a murderer). Ridiculing Ayatollah Khamenei’s reference to the “ship of the regime”, he says that the current regime is like a “meagre barge” not a large “galleon”.
Today, I want to extend my best wishes to all who are celebrating Nowruz in the United States and around the world. On this New Year’s celebration, friends and family have a unique opportunity to reflect on the year gone by; to celebrate their time together; and to share in their hopes for the future.
1400 GMT: The Next Nowruz Message…is reported to have come from Mehdi Karroubi.
(http://bit.ly/bLnMG0)
1245 GMT: Rumour of Day/Rafsanjani Watch. Two features in one, as news flies that Hossein Marashi, a relative and ally of Hashemi Rafsanjani, will be released
within days of his Thursday sentencing to one year in prison.
(http://www.dw-world.de/dw/article/0,,5374138,00.html)
Iranian media are speaking of “hidden hands” behind Marashi’s release (http://www.khabaronline.ir/news-50341.aspx)
Deutsche Welle argues that this is bad news for the President, given the pressure of the Expediency Council (headed by Rafsanjani) to change electoral laws. Rafsanjani has also apparently managed to gain the support of the Combatant Clergy Assocation, headed by key conservative Ayatollah Mahdavi Kani. Another sign of Rafsanjani’s growing influence is the lifting of the ban on Shargh newspaper, which is meant to restart publication in two weeks.
So was Marashi’s arrest due to Ahmadinejad supporters trying to clip the challenge of Rafsanjani? And have they only succeeded in making that challenge stronger?
ROOZ: How were the individuals to be arrested selected and what was the arrest process?
INTERROGATOR:All the people who were arrested were influential in creating the turbulent atmosphere of the 10th Presidential election because of their history of activism. In effect, all the people who were arrested initially had a leadership role, either by making speeches, giving interviews, publishing articles, etc. Also, the country’s intelligence and security apparatus had information that some people were planning to use the election process as an excuse to create chaos and disturbance under the name of soft or color revolution, similar to what took place in several other countries.
2120 GMT: Mahmoud Goes to the Country? OK, it’s not just Internet chatter. EA readers bring me up to speed: in a televised statement on Friday night, President Ahmadinejad set out the possibility of a referendum on his proposal to control $40 billion from subsidy reductions (the Parliament only gave him $20 billion).
And Ahmadinejad wasn’t pulling punches: he said that his “conservative” opponents in Parliament were verging on “treason” with exaggerated statements of the inflationary potential of his plan. Fortunately, he reassured, their economic estimates were not correct.
2110 GMT: Containing the Poet. Another story to pick up — National Public Radio has a profile of 82-year-old Simin Behbahani, the poet who is so dangerous that Iranian authorities seized her passport as she was about to board a flight for an awards ceremony in Paris.
1750 GMT: It’s All About US and Us. A slowish news phase, so the media are focusing on Ayatollah Khamenei’s Sunday speech. It’s on the lines of the Twitter publicity put out by his office (1330 and 1420 GMT), but this extract is especially provocative:
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