Replies

Disgusted Iranians Form Aid Committees, Warn Against Misuse Of Aids

SMCCDI (Information Service)
Dec 27, 2003

Tens of thousands of Iranians and students have formed local committees in order to collect aid and provide help to the rescapees of the deadly quake which has killed thousands of Iranians in the Kerman Province. Disgusted by various reports stating about the catastrophic conditions of the Bam and Jiroft residents and the lack of real attention and support from the official circles, money, food and materials are getting collected in order to be shipped from main Iranian cities by trucks conducted by their owners or voluntary drivers.

Many Iranians, not concerned by politic till now, are showing anger and voicing up with many already against the regime.

Unprecedented courageous public accusations are made against the regime and its leaders by angry Iranians. Many of them are qualifying, publicly, the regime and its leaders as "bunch of thieves and murderers mainly concerned by spending Iranians' money for Terrorism purposes or to place it abroad rather than spending it for the sake of the People".

Talks are made in public cabs and buses, in the streets or on the campuses on the need of a "wide scale revolution which will purify Iran from mullahs and their collaborators".

The deadly Kerman quake and the increasing number of deaths, due to the incompetency of the regime, have contributed to cut off the last few moral barriers which were existing among some Iranians for wishing a radical change in Iran no matter the cost will be.

Abroad Iran, local committees are getting formed in most US and European cities by Iranians and their friends in order to collect aid and to transfer it by "secure ways" to Iran and the quake's rescapees. Iranians remembering how the regime's men confiscated and sold, in the black market, the aids made in the last decade to Roodbar's quake's rescapees are avoiding all official channels by preferring to send via family members these aids or by giving them to well known and respectable organizations, such as, "Mercy Corps." or "Doctors Without Borders".

E.mails are circulating on the net asking from anybody wishing to help to avoid giving them to groups known for having "close relation" with the regime. The main accused are the self called "Iranian American National Council" (NIAC), the self-called "American Iranian Council" (AIC) and religious foundations, such as, the Los Angeles based "Iman foundation". The anger of the Iranian Diaspora has increased against these pro-regime lobby groups as the head of the AIC has used the quake's occasion for again asking the end of sanctions against the clerical regime.

It's to note that the main heads of the NIAC, AIC and Iman foundation have been working hard in order to help the establishment of relations between the US's consecutive administrations and the repressive clerics by trying to make believe to American officials that Iran's becoming a Democracy and that the regime has legitimacy among Iranians.

http://www.daneshjoo.org/generalnews/article/publish/article_4236.shtml

Stench of death in Iran quake city

Reuters - World News
Dec 28, 2003

BAM - Iran's earthquake-devastated city of Bam was filled with the stench of death on Sunday as a top foreign rescuer warned hopes were fading of finding any more survivors from a disaster that killed at least 20,000 people.

U.S. President George W. Bush's administration cast aside its branding of Iran as an "axis of evil" state to begin sending in military plane-loads of aid and held rare talks with a government it has shunned diplomatically for two decades.

From China to South Africa, Britain to Australia, nations reacted swiftly to send rescue workers, doctors, tents and cash to help deal with what appeared to be the world's most lethal earthquake in at least 10 years.

The quake also injured 30,000 people. Bam airport was converted into a sprawling, makeshift hospital and rubble-strewn pavements were lined with injured, some on intravenous drips.

President Mohammad Khatami said Iran could not cope on its own, as authorities battled to accommodate thousands of homeless people on a second bitterly cold in the historic Silk Road city where Friday's quake flattened about 70 percent of its mostly mud-brick buildings.

"Everyone is doing their best to help, but the disaster is so huge that I believe no matter how much is done we cannot meet the people's expectations," Khatami said on state television.

SURVIVORS ENDURE SECOND COLD NIGHT

Officials said many survivors should be in tents by late on Saturday, but witnesses said a number of people spent the night in the open among palm groves around Bam, burning cardboard and any other material they could find to fend off the cold.

Witnesses said cemeteries in Bam were overflowing with fully clothed corpses and that hundreds of bodies had been tipped into trenches hollowed out by mechanical diggers.

"I am burying myself in this grave," Fatemeh, 35, said as she buried her two children.

The quake measured 6.3 on the Richter scale and struck early on Friday when many people were at home asleep in Bam, a city with a population of about 80,000 some 1,000 km (600 miles) southeast of the capital Tehran.

Experts said there was a risk of more tremors to come.

In rare direct contact between Washington and Tehran, U.S. Deputy Secretary of State Richard Armitage and Iran's permanent representative to the United Nations, Mohammad Javad Zarif, held phone talks to discuss humanitarian aid.

"Given the urgency of the situation we deemed direct contact to be the most appropriate channel," U.S. State Department spokesman Lou Fintor told reporters.

U.S. MILITARY FLIES IN AID

The U.S. military said it had sent a transport plane with medical and humanitarian supplies to Iran and would ship around 68 tonnes of aid from logistics sites in the Gulf, in place for the U.S.-led war on Iraq and its reconstruction.

It said it was sending bandages and other dressings as well as blankets and pyjamas for the homeless.

Washington broke ties with the Iran after students stormed the U.S. embassy in Tehran in 1979 and held 52 Americans hostage for 444 days. In 2002, Bush branded Iran part of an "axis of evil" for allegedly developing weapons of mass destruction.

The Islamic Republic's quick acceptance of help contrasted with its rejection in 1990 when a quake killed 36,000 people.

Officials have said this time help would be welcome from everywhere except Israel.

Roland Schlachter, heading a team of 10 rescuers from the Swiss Corps for Humanitarian Aid, said the chances of finding any more survivors were extremely low.

"It has to do with the way the houses were built and have collapsed. There appears to be very few air spaces created when the buildings collapsed," he told German television.

Iranian authorities said too many people from nearby towns were rushing to help, causing traffic chaos on a main road into Bam and hampering the flow of aid and rescue teams.

Bam, a popular tourist spot because of an historic citadel and other centuries-old buildings, has a history going back to the old Silk Road route days when it was a stopover for merchants and travellers between China and Europe.

A large part of the citadel was destroyed by the quake, dealing a blow to Bam's future economy if tourists are no longer attracted to the city.

The Interior Ministry confirmed on Saturday the death toll was now 20,000.

http://www.daneshjoo.org/generalnews/article/publish/article_4237.shtml

UN finds European states helped Iran nuclear program

By The Associated Press
12.28.2003

VIENNA - Pakistani scientists may have played a major role in advancing Iran's nuclear program, but more than a half-dozen other countries are now being drawn into the UN investigation, diplomats and arms experts say.

A month-long probe by the International Atomic Energy Agency has traced the origins of Iran's program to the late 1980s, when Iran was supplied with the first drawings on centrifuge technology, its main way of enriching uranium - leading to suspicions it was developing nuclear weapons.

The investigations have widened "well beyond" Pakistan, Russia and China to include companies in Germany, Switzerland, Austria and other West European countries, said one diplomat.

There are no UN or other international sanctions against Iran that would have prevented foreign companies from providing equipment that could be used in a nuclear program. But investigating companies yielded useful information when the world body investigated Iraq's weapons programs in the early 1990s.

One of those diplomats, talking on condition of anonymity, also linked Pakistan to North Korea's weapons program, saying U.S. intelligence had "pretty convincing" evidence of such a connection.

Iran and North Korea are the key concerns of the Vienna-based UN atomic agency, whose main task is to curb weapons proliferation through inspections and monitoring of countries that have ratified the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty. North Korea withdrew from that treaty after the Bush administration confronted Pyongyang about its nuclear program late last year.

After months of intense international pressure, Iran now is cooperating with IAEA efforts to unravel nearly two decades of covert activities that the United States and other countries say point to a weapons program.

Iran insists its nuclear activities are peaceful. But suspicions have heightened with revelations that it was enriching uranium, and the discovery of traces of weapons-grade enriched uranium on some of its centrifuge equipment.

A diplomat said the agency was following up on three to four different samples of highly enriched uranium - beyond the two whose existence had been previously revealed.

The agency is trying to trace the origins of the equipment to test Iranian claims that Tehran did not enrich uranium to weapons grade and that the highly enriched traces were inadvertently "imported" on the components.

Neither Iran nor the IAEA have revealed the countries of origin, but diplomats had previously told the AP that Pakistan, China and Russia were among the probable suppliers.

Russia has acknowledged signing a contract with Iran in the mid-1990s to deliver equipment that could be used for laser enrichment of uranium, but officials in Moscow say the contract was canceled several years later in response to U.S. pressure in the initial stages of the program.

Pakistan, itself a nuclear power, acknowledged Tuesday that several of its nuclear scientists may have shared sensitive technology with Iran, but insisted the government never authorized it. Officials said information provided by the IAEA prompted the questioning of some scientists.

Pakistan has long been suspected of proliferation during its 30-year effort to build nuclear weapons - of sending nuclear technology to North Korea in exchange for missiles, or helping Libya and Iraq.

http://www.haaretzdaily.com/hasen/spages/376701.html

U.S., Iran Hold High Level Talks on Quake Relief

Yahoo! News
Dec 28, 2003

CRAWFORD, Texas (Reuters) - High level U.S. and Iranian officials put aside diplomatic differences to directly discuss humanitarian aid after the earthquake that killed tens of thousands of Iranians, a State Department official said on Saturday.

Spokesman Lou Fintor told reporters the discussion took place in a phone call between Deputy Secretary of State Richard Armitage and Iran's permanent representative to the United Nations, Mohammad Javad Zarif.

"Given the urgency of the situation we deemed direct contact to be the most appropriate channel," Fintor said.

The White House said earlier the United States would send government and civilian emergency workers and 150,000 pounds of medical supplies to Iran following the quake that razed much of the ancient Silk Road city of Bam and killed about 20,000 people.

White House spokesman Scott McClellan said in a statement that the United States was working with Iranian authorities, the United Nations and the International Red Cross and Red Crescent.

Washington broke relations with the Islamic republic after students stormed the U.S. Embassy in Tehran in 1979 and held 52 Americans hostage for 444 days.

President Bush (news - web sites), in his 2002 State of the Union speech, branded Iran as part of an "axis of evil." But the president offered condolences to the families of the dead and injured on Friday and promised the United States would provide humanitarian aid.

U.S. officials usually communicate with Tehran through intermediaries, often channeling messages through Swiss diplomats.

Fintor played down the diplomatic significance of the direct contacts with Iran.

"There is no political angle. There is a humanitarian catastrophe in Iran and our only mission is to alleviate the human suffering associated with yesterday's earthquake," he said.

Iran's quick acceptance of help contrasts with its rejection in 1990 of outside doctors, workers, blood supplies, sniffer dogs and used clothes after an earthquake claimed 36,000 lives and injured 100,000 people.

The United Sates will send medical response teams from Boston, Los Angeles and Virginia and disaster experts from government agencies, McClellan said. The U.S. military will deliver medical supplies from bases in Kuwait, said the spokesman, who was with Bush at his Texas ranch.

Separately, World Vision, a major U.S.-based humanitarian relief organization, announced it plans to airlift supplies to Iran next week.

World Vision said it would send an airlift of $250,000 worth of supplies including plastic sheeting and water purification tablets and equipment.

http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&cid=584&e=3&u=/nm/20031228/pl_nm/quake_iran_usa_dc

Toll 20,000 & Rising as Quake Crews Dig

December 28, 2003
NY Daily
Jose Martinez

Rescue crews desperately dug through mounds of rubble yesterday, looking for signs of life in an ancient Iranian city leveled by a massive earthquake that left at least 20,000 people dead.

As humanitarian aid from around the world began pouring into Bam, a city in southeast Iran, estimates of the dead ranged far higher.

"As more bodies are pulled out, we fear that the death toll may reach as high as 40,000," said Akbar Alavi, the mayor of Kerman, the provincial capital.

Poking with shovels and clawing by hand, workers searched for anyone who may have been trapped by mounds of poorly built structures of unreinforced mud brick that crumbled onto people.

"We don't have anything, just our bare hands," said rescue worker Omid Alipour, who said his unit dug out three injured victims.

More than 150 survivors, including an infant, were pulled from the rubble yesterday, according to Masoud Amiri, an officer with the Revolutionary Guards.

But the rising number of dead overwhelmed a region that crumbled under the world's deadliest earthquake since 1990 - when 50,000 were killed, also in Iran.

Corpses crowded cemeteries, relatives cried for the missing and rescuers were warned to wear gloves as many of the dead were dragged to mass graves to prevent disease outbreaks.

"Bam has turned into a wasteland," said Interior Minister Abdolvahed Mousavi Lari.

"Even if a few buildings are standing, you cannot trust to live in them."

Officials said about 70% of the centuries-old city was destroyed, and that Bam's airport had been converted into a makeshift hospital.

Teams of rescuers from around of the world, including more than 200 Americans, began arriving in Iran.

The U.S., which does not have formal relations with Iran - a member of President Bush's so-called axis of evil - volunteered to send 150,000 pounds of medical supplies and water purification equipment in a military airlift.

The aid offer stemmed from highly unusual direct talks between Iran and the United States involving Deputy Secretary of State Richard Armitage and Iran's permanent representative to the United Nations, Mohammad Javad Zarif.

Top administration officials emphasized, though, that the assistance does not mark a change in U.S. policy toward Iran.

But the Islamic state rebuffed an offer of aid from Israel.

"Iran prefers to play politics instead of accepting a generous offer by private Israelis," said Avi Pazner, a spokesman for the Israeli government. "It is their decision."

The State Department also confirmed that at least one American was killed and another injured while visiting a 2,000-year-old Bam citadel that was reduced to rubble.

The walled city, which is more than 600 miles from Tehran, was hit with a wave of aftershocks yesterday, hindering some rescuers.

http://www.nydailynews.com/news/story/149821p-132092c.html

Iranian Leaders to Victims: Better That You Die Than We Accept Israeli Help

December 28, 2003
Arutz Sheva
israelnn.com

Iran took time out from dealing with its tens of thousands of earthquake casualties to spew forth more hatred towards Israel - even at the expense of its own dead, wounded, orphans and homeless. "The Islamic Republic of Iran," announced the country's official news agency IRNA, "welcomes all the humanitarian aid being offered by various countries and organizations - except for that from the Zionist entity."

Despite the above, Foreign Minister Silvan Shalom issued a statement of condolences, saying, "The Government of Israel and the people of Israel feel the pain of the human tragedy being experienced by the Iranian people. Amidst all our differences, what is required at these moments is total mobilization by the international community to help the families of the dead and injured."

It should also be noted that during the height of recent Greek-Turkish hostilities, the two countries sent aid to each other when they both suffered earthquakes a month apart in 1999.

Private and public Israeli groups are attempting, despite the Iranian government's hostility, to help ease the enemy country's human suffering, via third parties or other unofficial channels. "This is not a political question," said Dr. Mike Naftali, Chairman of the Topaz Humanitarian Fund of the Israeli Kibbutz Movement. "Tens of thousands of children are suffering terribly, and it is incumbent upon us, as human beings, to help them."

http://www.israelnn.com/news.php3?id=55219

Iran Press Lambasts Quake Efforts

December 28, 2003
BBC News
BBCi

Lack of preventive measures and the government's coordination of relief efforts following the Bam earthquake are receiving short shrift in the Iranian press.

One paper, however, hopes for a change of international attitude towards Iran as countries around the world, including the US and Israel, offer their assistance.

What the hell happened to crisis management, responsible governance, and all the talk about caring for those in most need?

Men, women and children dying in the thousands only because the state machinery was ill-prepared for natural disasters is mind-boggling, to say the least.

As for those who manage the affairs of 70m Iranians, they could do much better to be proactive than reactive.

Iran Daily (English-language web site)

If anyone told you that the quake victims of the past 10 or 20 years were still living in tents, you might not believe it. We are very good at lamenting and crying, but when it comes to planning, preventing and fortifying... we more or less do nothing but wait for the disaster to happen and then see what we can do.

We know how to spend billions of dollars on bread and petrol subsidies so no-one raises their voice. But we are not prepared to spend the same amount on a national plan for making buildings quake-proof.

Khorasan (conservative)

Those organisations or individuals issuing permits for buildings, factories producing sub-standard building materials and people or companies in the construction industry - don't any of them think that, one day, a building might collapse on their heads and the heads of their own children? They only think about how to turn one dollar into two.

It seems our experiences are only useful to other countries - they are the ones who learn from our mistakes.

Sharq (reformist)

How many times have we reminded the ruling establishment that the first structures to fall during a major earthquake would be those dealing with emergency management and relief, such as hospitals, police and fire stations?

Hospitals and other centres designated for disaster relief were among the first to collapse in yesterday's (26 December) tragic quake. The officials in charge are either deaf or simply don't care.

Iran News (English-language web site)

When hospitals and relief centres in the city have also been destroyed and their staff are among those killed, who is left to rush to the assistance of the injured and those under the rubble?

There is a need for serious and principled planning, and for these plans to be implemented throughout the country.

Kayhan (hardline, pro-Khamene'i)

The lack of preparations to receive voluntary assistance - many volunteers couldn't give their blood, for example - is another regrettable scene in this incident.

And the very sad lack of coordination has inflicted much damage on the people. Don't people have the right to be extremely worried if experience has shown that there is such a lack of coordination?

Aftab-e Yazd (reformist)

If Iran was newsworthy before the earthquake, it was because of accusations and allegations over nuclear and Al-Qaeda activities. The earthquake in Bam has greatly changed the atmosphere.

Israel's non-governmental organizations have asked for guidelines on assisting Iran... The White House has earmarked around m for Iran.

Not long ago, the atmosphere was one of trading allegations and hostile disputes. Now, in a complete about-face, it has become one of humanitarian assistance. This could help lay a new foundation of international relations.

America and Israel's relations with each other, and their relations with Iran, have undergone much tension and fluctuation, but they could follow another path.

Sharq (reformist)

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/3352479.stm

Decision Time for UK Search Team

December 28, 2003
BBC News
BBCi

British rescuers say they may leave the scene of the Iranian earthquake as the search operation draws to a close. The 20-strong Rapid-UK team had found only bodies despite searching non-stop since they reached the city of Bam on Saturday morning, a spokeswoman said.

Speaking on Sunday night, Gillian Dacey said they would decide early on Monday whether to remain there or return home.

The confirmed death toll from Friday morning's earthquake has now risen to 22,000, according to local officials.

Death toll 'may rise'

An estimated 80% of the city was flattened in the magnitude 6.3 tremor.

One local official said the death toll could reach 30,000.

Ms Dacey said: "We have managed to search a large area today, in conjunction with other teams from Turkey, Spain and Russia.

"It was a concerted effort but we found no survivors. The destruction has been so severe."

She said the team had not heard of anyone being found alive in the last couple of days at that the chances of finding survivors was now "very slight".

"The reason is that the collapse of the structures is so complete, the voids, the spaces that we would normally look in are just not there and if they are, the amount of dust is likely to have led to asphyxiation", she added.

"The chances of survival are very low."

She said the search effort would probably not continue overnight because the team would not receive any new information from local people after dark.

'Worthwhile operation'

The group would join other British rescue teams and the Department for International Development in deciding whether to leave the area in the morning, she said.

"It is being looked into because we believe our part here, the search and rescue of victims, is drawing to a close."

Ms Dacey said the support the team had shown to the local population meant the operation had been worthwhile, despite not finding any survivors.

"It is important for them to know that someone from the outside world is caring for them", she said.

About 400 foreign experts have joined rescue and recovery efforts including fire and rescue crews from Essex, the British-based International Rescue Corps and sniffer dogs from British International Rescue Dogs and Canis.

The US has sent two planes carrying food and aid as well as about 200 rescue and medical experts.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/3353193.stm

A MESSAGE TO THE MULLAHS

By AMIR TAHERI

December 28, 2003 -- WITHIN the next few days, Egypt's President Hosni Mubarak is expected to decide whether or not to pay a stay visit to Iran. According to Egyptian and Iranian sources, his decision depends on a symbolic move by the leadership in Tehran.

Mubarak wants the Iranians to change the name of a Tehran street. The reason? The street, where the Egyptian Embassy building is located, bears the name of Khalid al-Islambouli, one of the terrorists involved in the assassination of President Anwar Sadat in 1981. Facing the embassy's main entrance is a giant-size mural of al-Islambouli that Mubarak also wants removed.

The current assumption is that unless those demands are met, the Egyptian president will not go to Tehran.

I think Mubarak should go, even if the street's name is not changed and the assassin's mural is not removed.

There are several reasons why that is the right course.

To start with, Mubarak should not make any of his decisions conditional to what terrorists or their supporters might or might not do.

The decision to change the name of the street in question does not rest with President Muhammad Khatami, who has invited Mubarak.

Strictly legally speaking, Khatami does not even have the right to invite a foreign head of state to Iran. Under the 1979 Constitution and its amendments, the president is not the head of state. He is the head of the executive, a kind of prime minister whose title is "president".

Legally speaking, the head of state in the Islamic Republic of Iran is Ali Khamenehi, the mullah who bears the title of "Supreme Guide." In that position he is the head of all three branches of government and commander-in-chief. He has the power to dismiss the president, dissolve the parliament and even suspend the rules of Islam if he so pleases.

For more than two decades, however, most foreign heads of states and other foreign dignitaries have chosen to ignore those facts, acting as if the Iranian president were the head of state.

Technically, this is a major diplomatic concession to Iran because it assumes that the Iranian "Supreme Guide," which the Constitution presents as the leader of all Muslims throughout the world, stands higher than other heads of state.

Having accepted this, Mubarak would be wrong to cancel his visit because of the al-Islambouli issue, which is part of the power game played out in Tehran.

By the latest count, there are some 30 Tehran streets that bear the names of various Iranian and foreign terrorists and other murderers. The street where the British Embassy is located is named after Bobby Sands, an IRA terrorist. The street where Hassan Ali Mansour, one of Iran's prime ministers, once lived is named after the man who murdered him.

Less radical Khomeinists like Khatami are embarrassed by all that and wish to do something about it. More radical Khomeinists, however, see any attempt at taking off the names of the terrorists as a direct attack on their ideology.

The truth is that Khatami is unable to bring about the street name change demanded by Mubarak. That decision belongs to the Tehran Municipal Council and mayor. Tehran's new mayor is a hard line Khomeinist who regards Khatami as a traitor. The new municipality is dominated by hardliners who hate Mubarak as much as they hate Ariel Sharon.

The new mayor and the new municipality were elected earlier this year thanks to the massive boycott of the polls by the Tehrani electorate.

Less than 15 per cent of those eligible to vote went to the polls, enabling the radicals to win control of a megapolis of some 12 million people with a few thousand votes. Thus, whatever that the mayor and the municipality might decide to do, or not to do, would not reflect the real views of the Tehranis.

Mubarak should go as guest of the Iranian people.

Rightly or wrongly, Egypt remains the most popular Arab country in Iran. In fact, many Iranians believe that Egypt, despite the recent decline in its relative importance, remains the key Arab world with which Iran should forge close relations. Also, many Iranians regard Anwar Sadat as a hero.

The political gangsters who have put the name of terrorists on Tehran streets did so, in part, to prevent people like Mubarak from going to Iran. This is precisely why Mubarak should not allow that trick to work.

Many world leaders have understood this. For example, British Foreign Secretary Jack Straw has visited Tehran five times in two years, ignoring the daily insult of having his embassy's door opening in a street named after an IRA terrorist. Various French foreign ministers have also visited Tehran, ignoring the streets named after terrorists who killed more than two dozen French men and women in Paris in the 1980s.

Mubarak should know that, at this juncture in history, Iran has two personae, locked in a conflict.

One persona is that of Iran as the embodiment of a revolution whose aim is to conquer, first the Muslim world and then the entire globe. This persona not only honors terrorists but also finances and sponsors terrorism. It is the enemy of Egypt, just as it is the enemy of the Iranian people.

Under that persona, Iran would be isolated from the world, with North Korea as a model. That isolation would enable the ideology of terrorism to perpetuate the fiction that Iran is the vanguard of a global revolution in the name of Islam.

But Mubarak's advisors would know that the murderous persona in question no longer represents the mainstream of Iranian politics.

The other persona represents Iran as a nation-state whose interest is in developing the best of relations with all countries, especially one such as Egypt that is heir to a great civilization.

Let the Khomeinist gangsters cling to their terrorist icons. What matters is to show that their Middle East policy has hit a wall.

Khomeini had vowed to never allow a restoration of ties with Egypt unless the Egyptians tore up the Camp David accords that led to peace with Israel. Well, the Egyptians have not done so, and their leader could go to Tehran to show that Khomeini was wrong to sever ties in the first place.

Mubarak appearing in Tehran would be a moment of humiliation for those who wish people like-Islambouli to rule the Muslim world.

I am no great fan of President Mubarak. In recent days, however, I have been bombarded with telephone calls and e-mails from all over Iran asking me to spread the message that the Egyptian leader should go to Iran, and that his visit would be a blow to the hardliners on the eve of the Iranian general election.

In Tehran, Mubarak would show that the outside world, starting with the Muslim countries, is prepared to accept Iran as a friend and partner provided it abandons its revolutionary pretensions and terrorist projects. And that is the message that the overwhelming majority of Iranians wish to hear.

So, Mr. President: Ahlan wa sahlan - please do go to Iran. You have many more friends there than you think.

E-mail: amirtaheri@benadorassociates.com

http://www.nypost.com/postopinion/opedcolumnists/14572.htm