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Join Us At Today's Iranian Alert Thread – The Most Underreported Story Of The Year!

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[DoctorZIn]

Join Us At Today's Iranian Alert Thread – The Most Underreported Story Of The Year!

"If you want on or off this Iran ping list, Freepmail DoctorZin”

[DoctorZIn]

Dozens of UFO sightings excite Iran
Colorful lights over cities spark flying-saucer fever

Posted: April 28, 2004
5:00 p.m. Eastern
© 2004 WorldNetDaily.com

The latest location on planet Earth to be hit with UFO fever is Iran, as dozens of sightings have been reported in recent days in the Islamic republic.

According to Reuters, state-run television today broadcast a sparkling white disc flying over the capital of Tehran, saying it was filmed last night.

People were reported rushing out into the streets in eight towns last night to watch a bright "extraterrestrial light dipping in and out of the clouds."

The Islamic Republic News Agency also reports colorful objects seen beaming out green, red, blue and purple rays over the northern cities of Tabriz and Ardebil and in the Caspian Sea province of Golestan.

And cartoons of alien spacecraft have been gracing the front pages of local newspapers this week.

An air force officer in the Revolutionary Guards was quoted in the reformist Vagha-ye Etefaghiyeh daily saying Iran's Supreme National Security Council should investigate whether these visitors from afar had hostile intent, according to Reuters.

But Sa'dollah Nasiri-Qeydari, head of the Astronomical Society of Iran, told the wire service the stories were unfounded.

"In my opinion, flying saucers do not exist," he said, insisting his telescopes would have spotted any potential invaders from space.

"The people who have seen these things are not experts – farmers, villagers and pilots," he added.

Nasiri-Qeydari suggests people could actually be viewing the planet Venus, whose light could be given different colors when filtered through the atmosphere.

As WorldNetDaily reported earlier this month, residents of Australia got a case of UFO fever when what has been speculated to be a meteor lit up the sky with light comparable to "50,000 spotlights."

http://www.worldnetdaily.com/news/article.asp?ARTICLE_ID=38250

[DoctorZIn]

Flying Saucer Fever Grips Iran

April 28, 2004
Reuters
Christian Oliver

TEHRAN -- Is Iran about to be invaded by little green men or are the Americans racing through the night sky in spaceships to spy on their arch-foe the Islamic Republic?

Flying saucer fever has gripped Iran after dozens of sightings in the last few days. Fanciful cartoons of alien spacecraft have adorned the front pages.

State television on Wednesday showed a sparkling white disc it said was filmed over Tehran on Tuesday night.

More colourful Unidentified Flying Objects (UFOs) have been spotted beaming out green, red, blue and purple rays over the northern cities of Tabriz and Ardebil and in the Caspian Sea province of Golestan, the official IRNA news agency reported.

Newspapers and agencies reported people rushing out into the streets in eight towns on Tuesday night to watch a bright extraterrestrial light dipping in and out of the clouds.

An airforce officer in the Revolutionary Guards was quoted in the reformist Vagha-ye Etefaghiyeh daily saying Iran's Supreme National Security Council should investigate whether these visitors from afar had hostile intent.

But Sa'dollah Nasiri-Qeydari, head of the Astronomical Society of Iran, told Reuters the stories were unfounded.

"In my opinion, flying saucers do not exist," he said, insisting his telescopes would have picked up invaders from outer space.

"The people who have seen these things are not experts - farmers, villagers and pilots," he added.

He said what people reported was consistent with the planet Venus, whose intense light in its current position would be given different hues by being filtered through the atmosphere.

http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&cid=857&ncid=757&e=10&u=/nm/20040428/od_uk_nm/oukoe_space_iran_ufos

[DoctorZIn]

Germany and Iran Embroiled in Diplomatic Spat

April 28, 2004
Deutsche Welle
dw-world.de

In response to a contoversial plaque unveiled in Berlin last week, Tehran plans to post signs accusing Germany of supplying Saddam Hussein with chemical weapons during the Iran-Iraq war.

Visitors to the German embassy in Tehran will soon walk past a denunciatory plaque hanging outside the building's gate, reminding all who enter that Germany contributed to Saddam Hussein's chemical weapons arsenal and shared responsibility for the death of thousands of Iranian soldiers in the Iran-Iraq war during the 1980s.

Tehran's city council gave the order to put up the plaque on Tuesday in retaliation for last week's unveiling of a memorial in the Berlin neighborhood of Charlottenburg which accused Tehran of murdering four Iranian Kurdish dissidents at the Mykonos restaurant in 1992.

The 50 centimeter by 70 centimeter plaque in the upscale Berlin district carries the names of the victims of the bloody attack and the words: "Murdered by the regime in Iran at the time. They died fighting for freedom and human rights."

The accusation on the Mykonos plaque refers to a German court ruling from 1997 that concluded the killers of the four men were acting on Tehran's orders and that Iran was guilty of practicing state terrorism. Iran denied any involvement, but the German government recalled its ambassador and suspended dialogue with the Islamic republic for a year after that.

Tit-for-tat

Only one day after the unveiling ceremony in Berlin, Germany's ambassador to Iran, Paul von Maltzahn, was summoned to the foreign ministry to listen to Tehran's "strong objection" to the plaque.

On Thursday, authorities closed down a German government-funded language institute in Tehran, allegedly because the center did not have the necessary permits to operate. The organization -- similar to the Goethe Institute in other countries -- had been running since 1996 and employed 25 teachers to teach some 3,000 pupils.

Diplomats in Tehran have said the school's closure is in direct response to the Mykonos memorial. They said that the institute's permit was issued in 1996 and limited to just four years, but the center had been operating without official permission since 2000. It wasn't forced to close until two days after the controversial plaque was hung in Berlin.

Tehran denounces Germany

The diplomatic tit-for-tat reached a highpoint on April 27, when the Tehran city council ordered two memorial plaques -- one near the German embassy and the other at a sanatorium for victims injured by Iraq's chemical attacks -- to be posted blaming Germany for supplying Iraq with chemical weapons during the eight year Iran-Iraq war.

"These plaques are to disclose crimes of the countries that produce chemical weapons," the council's chairman Mehdi Chamran was quoted as saying by the official Islamic Republic News Agency.

"We impeach Germany ... as a partner of Saddam and one of the most important providers of chemical weapons to Saddam's repugnant regime," he said.

Tehran's hardline mayor, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, justified installing the denunciatory signs as "the least we can do to defend the rights or our nations."

Along with several Western and Arab states, Iran has accused Germany of providing Iraq with key technological assistance for the production of chemical weapons used against Iranian soldiers between 1980 and 1988. Close to a million people -- mostly Iranians -- were killed during the fierce fights along the border.

Diplomatic rapprochement

Despite the tense atmosphere, sources in Teheran have told Deutsche Welle that the diplomatic spat may be cooling down and that the language institute will most likely re-open in the next few days as Germany's foreign ministry distances itself from the Mykonos plaque.

In an interview published Monday with the German ambassador in Tehran, Maltzahn told the Iranian newspaper Keyhan that the German foreign ministry did not approve of the Berlin plaque. He criticized it for damaging otherwise congenial German-Iranian relations.

http://www.dw-world.de/english/0,3367,1432_A_1184162_1_A,00.html

[DoctorZIn]

Iranian Censors Approve Screening of Gibson's 'The Passion'

April 28, 2004
The Associated Press
Ha'aretz

TEHRAN -- Iran's censors have approved the screening of Mel Gibson's "The Passion of the Christ" in the Persian state's cinemas, the official news agency reported Wednesday.

A committee of clerics and officials within Iran's Islamic Cultural and Guidance Ministry unanimously decided Tuesday to let the film be played in its entirety, with Persian language subtitles, the agency said.

The state-owned Farabi Cinema Foundation, which is in charge of foreign movies, bought a copy of Gibson's controversial film in February and has negotiated with theater owners to screen it in May, the agency added.

Iran, a predominantly Shiite Muslim state, is allowing the screening of the film despite strong Islamic objections, particularly from Sunni Muslims, to the depiction of religious prophets in any form.

In Kuwait, senior Shiites have called for the movie's screening because, as one cleric said, it "reveals crimes committed by Jews against Christ."

Egypt, United Arab Emirates, Jordan and several other Islamic countries have already approved the screening of the movie directed by Gibson, who has been accused in the West of reviving the Jews-killed-Christ claim that has stoked anti-Semitism through the ages.

Iran and Israel are arch foes and Tehran cut its diplomatic and trade relations with the Jewish state following the Iranian revolution in 1979.

http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/pages/ShArt.jhtml?itemNo=421376&contrassID=1&subContrassID=8&sbSubContrassID=0&listSrc=Y

[DoctorZIn]

France To Probe 2000 Tehran Attack

April 28, 2004
Dow Jones Newswires
The Associated Press

PARIS -- French judicial officials have opened an investigation of an attack four years ago in the Iranian capital for which an opposition group based in France claimed responsibility, judicial officials said Wednesday.

The investigation, opened on Tuesday, comes after months of reflection in both judicial and diplomatic quarters, according to the officials, who spoke on condition they not be named.

The probe was instigated after a Tehran resident injured in the attack filed a complaint in May 2003, the officials said.

On Feb. 5, 2000, numerous mortar shells fell on two official buildings in Tehran, the Iranian capital, killing one person and injuring several others. The People's Mujahedeen Organization of Iran claimed responsibility for the attack.

The organization is considered a terrorist organization by the U.S. and the European Union. It has an armed wing in U.S.-occupied Iraq that was disarmed a year ago by U.S. forces.

The French investigation is justified because the Mujahedeen organization, the chief exiled Iranian opposition group, has been based in Auvers-sur-Oise, outside Paris, for some 20 years, the officials said.

Judicial authorities in France are already investigating the Mujahedeen for terrorism financing and for "criminal association in connection with a terrorist enterprise."

In June 2003, masked police raided the People's Mujahedeen compound. A total of 17 people were placed under investigation, including Maryam Rajavi, who co-leads the Mujahedeen with her husband Massoud.

The Mujahedeen have vigorously denied the French charges, calling the arrests a "dirty deal" between Tehran and Paris meant to improve France's standing with the clerical regime.

The arrests set off dramatic protests - including two self-immolations. Six others were injured after they set themselves on fire. Some other supporters went on a hunger strike.

The People's Mujahedeen has been based in France since shortly after the 1979 Islamic revolution that toppled the Iranian monarchy and brought Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini to power. The group had initially supported the revolution, but fell out over its advocacy of a secular regime. It has offices in several cities in the West.

http://framehosting.dowjonesnews.com/sample/samplestory.asp?StoryID=2004042819040003&Take=1

[DoctorZIn]

Kerry's main Iranian fund raiser sues the Movement

SMCCDI (Announcement)
Apr 29, 2004

" To sin by silence, when we should protest, makes cowards out of men. The human race has climbed on protest. Had no voice been raised against injustice, ignorance and lust, the inquisition yet would serve the law, and guillotines decide our least disputes. The few who dare, must speak and speak again, to right the wrongs of many..." - ( Ella Wheeler Wilcox )

The primary Iranian supporter of Senator John Kerry and a subject of many controversies, Hassan Nemazee, has sued the "Student Movement Coordination Committee for Democracy in Iran (SMCCDI) and its coordinator for 10-million dollars in damages.

These two frivolous and potentially muffling law suits were filed on March 3rd at the 125th Judicial District Court of Harris County (Houston Texas) by Nemazee's hot shot lawyer, Charles R. Parker, who specializes in "complex business litigations." The SMCCDI's registrant was served on April 16th, and the Student Movement's coordinator, Aryo B. Pirouznia, was served on April 20th.

Tactically, the law suits are believed to be an attempt to publicly rehabilitate Nemazee's reputation. Being the subject of many less than positive discussions, Nemazee needs his image polished to cleanse John Kerry's Presidential campaign that has been tarnished with troubling questions on his international links.

Muffling, or forcing SMCCDI to cease operations would then give them a free hand in regard to the Iranian-American equation. Indeed, sustaining a judgment against SMCCDI could very well cause its' well known and valuable American operations to cease, as none of its US resident members have the resources to fight the Iranian-American businessman supporting Mr. Kerry.

A careful overview of the VII following parts will offer a better understanding of the situation:

I) Background:

The Plaintiff, Nemazee, a close friend of Al Gore, is a wealthy and controversial Iranian-American businessman who was nominated by President Clinton to be a U.S. Ambassador to Argentina. His nomination was rejected by the U.S. Senate, following the publication of some very troubling news on his financial activities in the famous and credible "Forbes Magazine." (see copy of this article at:
http://www.daneshjoo.org/interestingarticles/article/publish/article_3046.shtml )

Exposed, Nemazee joined the self proclaimed "American-Iranian Council" (AIC) headed by the notorious Hooshang AmirAhmadi who's a well known lobbyist for the Iranian Mulllahcracy. Within the majority of the Iranians and Iranian-Americans, AmirAhmadi is held in very low esteem for supporting the Islamic republic regime.

Joining the American-Iranian Council, Nemazee helped this group and its members by opening doors to the highest levels of the U.S. Democratic Party. His main mission was to promote this group, AIC, and to push for the establishment of diplomatic ties between the U.S. and the Islamic Republic regime. Using his contacts with Senator Jospeh Biden (D-DE), an influential member of the U.S. Senate's Foreign Affairs Committee, a controversial fundraising event at the IMAN Islamist Center of Los Angles was held, in 2002, and attended by Senator Biden where a substantial amount of money was collected. The IMAN's head, Sadegh Namazikhah, is also a board member of the AIC, and he is pushing for the cancellation of sanctions against the Mullahs' regime.

The affair turned into a scandal following SMCCDI's intervention and the reports published in Mr. Biden's home state's press. (see the article published in the Delaware News Journal at: http://www.daneshjoo.org/article/publish/article_1847.shtml )

In June 1, 2002, Nemazee invited Senator John Kerry (D-MA) to a controversial American-Iranian Council (AIC) Dinner-Gala held in San Francisco where he made a speech in favor of establishing ties with the Islamic regime. As board member of the AIC, he declared that the organization's mission was to create "the vehicle for a dialogue which will ultimately lead to a resumption of relations."

Again SMCCDI denounced the gala event and provoked, with help of other freedom loving groups, a noisy protest rally in front of the regrettable gathering (see the SMCCDI's Urgent Action Call at: http://www.daneshjoo.org/article/publish/article_81.shtml )

Meanwhile, AIC organized another very controversial meeting with the then acting U.S. Secretary of State, Madeleine Albright, who offered a formal apology to "Iran" (?). Indeed, influenced by the illegitimate group, Ms. Albright apologized despite knowing that the Islamic Republic is one of the main sponsors of terrorism and anti-Americanism in the World. In retrospect, her, Albright's, apology is considered a gift for bad behavior of the clerical regime. Several other meetings were organized on U.S. soil and abroad where officials of the Mullahs' regime, like Mehdi Karoubi, a cleric and Speaker of the Islamic Parliament, would meet with US officials and legislators.

II) Set backs and Alarming tactics:

The illegitimate activities described above, and claims of being supported by Iranians and Iranian-Americans but in reality rejected and denounced by millions is at the heart of this issue. Constant exposure and denunciations by SMCCDI and other groups of the real situation in Iran and the election of President Bush undermined AIC's false claim of progress of "reforms in Iran", while the impacts of the 9/11 atrocity illuminated the dangers of Islamism.

Nemazee, who "officially" resigned from the AIC at the end 2002, denies in 2004, of having suggested "any rapprochement with the Islamic regime." He also states "that he made a mistake joining AIC." Omitting to acknowledge, however, that such "mistakes" and activities bought more time for the Islamic regime to take more Iranian lives and foment more evil plans.

Several other AIC board members will resigned "officially" along with Nemazee, during the same period. The resignations of Akbar Ghahary and Faraj Alae-I were also tendered at about the same time. These same three activists, Nemazee, Gharary and Alae-I, then founded a new entity self calling itself the "Iranian American Political Action Committee" (IAPAC), in 2003.

Ghahary and Alae-I are wealthy Iranian businessmen Alae-I is the President of the Nasdaq listed Centillium Corp. and married to Susan Akbarpoor a very controversial young Iranian woman known to be close friend with Hashemi Rafsanjani's daughter. It's to note that Susan Akbarpoor who is involved in several lawsuits in N. California is also the founder of SiliconIran that purportedly promotes the exchange of technological research. She has been an ardent supporter of President Khatami and Foreign Minister Kamal Kharazzi and involved in the support of some speeches made by them in Los Angeles. The speeches turned into a massive protest demonstrations by Iranian-Americans who rejected their presence. (See FrontPage Magazine's article at:
http://www.daneshjoo.org/article/publish/article_3138.shtml )

Interestingly, IAPAC'S website is maintained by SiliconIran.

IAPAC's original founders, Nemazee, Ghahary and Alae-I, would consider it a success to rally few of good Iranians who are probably not familiar with all the past activities of the main founder.

The group's claim of focusing only on promoting Iranian-Americans in the U.S. avoids the appearance, therefore, of interfering in U.S.-Iran relations. It states on its website that the group supports candidates of both political camps, democrat and republican, but this seems to be a blatant attempt to mislead the casual observer. Throwing important resources behind the election of Senator John Kerry's U.S. Presidential bid, Nemazee, the principal founder of the group, is organizing big fundraising events like the one held in April in New York where Kerry collected millions of dollars (see New York Post of April 11th). Alae-I and his wife are also among Kerry's biggest contributors.

In addition, Akbar Ghahary, the third founder of the group, has attempted to mislead Iranians, during a believed paid Iranian TV interview, by stating "Senator John Kerry supports them in their quest for democracy." Acknowledging in a very controversial "face to face" Kerry type flip-flop, with Sharam Homayoon of Iranian Satellite TV network "Channel One" based in Los Angeles that "he was initially a pro-republican. Later, however, when his friend Hassan Nemazee introduced them to senior Democrat circles like Senator Biden he changed his mind. Now he offers, or promotes that it would be better for Iranians to back Senator Kerry for president because he supports their democratic aspirations."

Their activity of supporting Senator John Kerry was reported in one of Iran's leading newspapers in March of 2004.

Also, unconfirmed reports are stating that meetings were held between some of the founders of IAPAC and the Islamic foreign minister, during his last trip to the U.S. Some sources believe that there is a strong possibility that Nemazee's influence was behind the mysterious Iranian Official News Agency, Mehr, receipt of an e-mail from Senator Kerry's offices "promising to repair damages made by the Bush administration, if Kerry is elected."

It's to note that Adams, an aid to Kerry, declared in mid February that such news is "just a hoax." But nearly a month later, Beers, another Kerry aid, declared that "this was an internal memo among Democrats and "he's scratching his head, and can't understand how this letter ended up in the hands of Iranian official circles."

Compounding this line of thinking, Senator Kerry refuses to take a firm stand against the terrorist Mullah regime while U.S. soldiers are getting killed in Iraq by the Islamic republic's funded terrorists. Like Al Gore during his TV debate with Mr. Bush in the 2000 election campaign, Kerry believes that the Islamic regime "is a legitimate entity" and declares that it is "becoming democratic."

III) Pressure and Threats:

Nemazee's frivolous suits and malicious acts are results of SMCCDI's constant denunciation of his double agenda that intends, ultimately, to promote relations between the U.S. Administration and the Clerical regime.

Legally, Nemazee is a known PUBLIC FIGURE, due to his nomination by President Clinton as Ambassador to Argentina, and as a former board member of AIC. As a board member of AIC illegitimately claiming to lobby on "behalf" of Iranian-Americans for promotion of ties with the Islamic regime, and as a current main fund raising organizer for Senator John Kerry, his lawyers seek, in spite of the facts, to build part of their "case" by claiming that "he is not a public figure."

Also, adding fuel to Nemazee's denunciation, SMCCDI sent Senator E. Kennedy (D-MA), in July 2003, a request that the veteran Senator boycott the gala launch of IAPAC. The letter stated the fact that Nemazee, the main founding member of the group, is "one discredited and well-known agent of the Islamic republic WITHIN the Iranian-American community in the US." As millions of Iranians who reject the Islamic regime and anyone that supports it are well familiar with these two names. (see the SMCCDI's letter at: http://www.daneshjoo.org/article/publish/article_3035.shtml )

In this article, SMCCDI uses of the word "agent" which implied that Nemazee is a sympathetic lobbyist, or solicitor promoting ties with the Islamic regime, which was based upon his previous activities. But an e-mail from an individual named Morad Ghorban, an IAPAC official, later requested removal of the published SMCCDI letter suggesting that a probably fictitious e-mail, mass e-mailed by an unknown third party had been used by SMCCDI as the source for its letter to Senator Kennedy. The young and ambitious Ghorban probably didn't know that SMCCDI had already named and criticized Nemazee for his illegitimate actions in the Movement's "May 2002 Urgent Call for Action" rejecting the June 1, 2002, meeting of the AIC in San Francisco with the presence of the very same Senator John Kerry.

In response, an immediate reply, archived by SMCCDI, was sent to Ghorban stating "the SMCCDI, as any other responsible organization does not use or base its actions on unknown third party e-mails." Further, "the decision by SMCCDI to write to Senator Kennedy was based on Nemazee's prior controversial actions as a board member of the AIC that would alarm any respectable Iranian."

Requesting a public apology from SMCCDI, Nemazee's lawyer, Charles Parker, sent a letter to the SMCCDI on September 15, 2003. This letter attempted to build the false appearance, or case claiming Nemazee is not a public figure and a fictitious mass mailed e-mail was used as the basis of the letter sent to Senator E. Kennedy. Despite being notified about the fictitious e-mail, their letter conveniently failed to mention SMCCDI's reply to Morad Ghorban.

Therefore, SMCCDI disregarded the Nemazee lawyer's letter as another frivolous request in line with several other unsuccessful attempts to pressure his adversaries. Had the SMCCDI stated, or implied that Nemazee was a "foreign-agent" that suggests he would be required to register with the U.S Government his relationship with the Iranian regime. Placing things in perspective, Nemazee's role has been more akin to that of a used car salesman, which is also a form of an agent.

Unconfirmed reports are stating that some members of IAPAC might also sue SMCCDI. The important points are that none of them were officially part of IAPAC on the date the SMCCDI letter was addressed to Senator E. Kennedy; and the content of the letter targeted IAPAC's main founder and not its' members. Some of the members are honorable Iranians who are ignoring Nemazee's past and now they're getting used in something that is beyond only promoting Iranian-Americans in the US.

IV) Additional Info:

On February 2, 2004, SMCCDI issued a statement responding to a dinner invitation of the Islamic regime's envoy at the UN to a few misguided American legislators. The misguided legislators, Bob Ney and Arlen Specter were to attend a dinner that was to be followed by an official trip to Iran, in order to promote diplomatic ties. (See SMCCDI's Statement at:
http://www.daneshjoo.org/article/publish/article_3117.shtml )

Astonishingly, Arlen Specter is on the list of candidates sponsored by IAPAC, while Bob Ney has a controversial young Iranian adviser named Titra Parsi who's heading something called the "National Iranian American Council" (NIAC). A well known fervent supporter of Khatami and his so-called reforms, Titra Parsi is also a very close friend to Hooshang AmirAhamadi and a former board member of the AIC. He's known for several interviews, such as, with Los Angeles Times in which he praised President Khatami and his sham "reforms."

His new well financed NIAC creation is supposedly intended to promote Iranian Americans in the U.S. and is not to interfere in external relations. But in reality, NIAC seems also to be targeting the promotion of the 2nd version of regime's reformists. Amongst them is the defender of terrorists held at Guantanomo. The very same Nobel Prize winner Shirin Ebadi who forgets what's going on in her own country has become the mouthpiece of the Islamic regime's foreign policy. Ms. Ebadi has defended at several occasions the right of Taliban members and Islamist terrorists held at Guantanomo, while she has kept silent on the fate of political activists and students held by the Islamic regime in inhumane conditions. She has interfered in the affairs of France by slamming the French law on the veil in the well known French secular schools but she omits to say that thousands of Iranian women have been killed, injured or arrested in order to be forced to respect the Islamic veil.

With no surprise and as predicted in the SMCCDI's past Public Statements, NIAC and Akbar Ghahary are now involved in organizing, or supporting some speeches for Mrs. Ebadi on U.S. soil. The first of these speeches, promoted by NIAC, is to be held on May 12th at the Maryland University College Park.

http://www.niacouncil.org/events/events.asp

Babak Talebi, a student of Maryland's College Park and NIAC's Advisory Board Member and Treasurer, seems to be one of the organizers of the controversial event. He's known also as a fervent Khatami supporter and known for several interviews, such as, with Los Angeles Times in which he praised President Khatami and his sham "reforms."

The latter who at a time was misusing his university's name for the promotion of his website created for the promotion of Khatami, had to stop following that SMCCDI denounced his action and notified his university's management.

http://www.niacouncil.org/board.asp#

V) More troubling points and reactions:

On another front, following the article published in the Tehran Times on February 8, 2004, regarding Senator Kerry's e-mail promising to repair damages, SMCCDI issued an open letter to the presumptive democratic candidate. (see the SMCCDI's letter at: http://www.daneshjoo.org/article/publish/article_3130.shtml )

The Movement criticized Senator Kerry for his stand on Iran. The powerful letter was quoted by several radio talk shows and was the subject of many articles published in newspapers like the New York Sun and Washington Times, on March 1st and on March 12th.
NY Sun: http://www.daneshjoo.org/article/publish/article_3118.shtml

WT: http://www.daneshjoo.org/article/publish/article_3136.shtml
WT: http://www.daneshjoo.org/article/publish/article_3148.shtml

On March 1st and 2nd, 2004, two articles written by the investigative reporter Kenneth Timmerman were published in the Insight Magazine and in the Front Page Magazine. Titled "Kerry will abandon terror war" and "Kerry's Iranian Sugar Daddies" were articles criticizing Kerry's ill advised position supporting the Mullahs, the war on terror and SMCCDI's coordinator quotes.
IM: http://www.daneshjoo.org/article/publish/article_3139.shtml

FPM: http://www.daneshjoo.org/article/publish/article_3138.shtml

VI) The Law Suit:

On March 3rd, after the publications of Washington Times (Kerry and the Ayatollahs) and Insight Magazine (Kerry will Abandon Terror War) on March 1st and FrontPage Magazine (Kerry's Iranian Sugar Daddies) on March 2nd, Nemazee and his friends recognized that the only way to muffle, or possibly strangle SMCCDI was to mire the organization in a long judicial process.

Seeking to obscure the manipulations from afar, Nemazee directed his lawyer, Charles Parker, to file suits against the SMCCDI and its coordinator. The suits have been filed and officially served. Seeking to muffle the voice of the SMCCDI just prior to the upcoming US Presidential election in a desperate attempt to rehabilitate him self and avenge past miscalculations. Losing the ambassador fiasco and betting on Presidential Kerry's win is an ambitious means of revenge for his own past mistakes.

VII) Unfinished Business:

Nemazee's lawyer's contention that SMCCDI quoted or posted an unknown third party's e-mail is a baseless claim and, at best, a transparent ruse to manipulate the American judicial system. In addition, Nemazee is legally a public figure subject to criticism since the Presidential ambassadorial nomination of December 30, 1998, as related to all controversies published on this case and the above mentioned opinions.

In reaction, the SMCCDI's officers are seeking an attorney, or attorneys that would consider legally representing the organization pro-bono or with minimal fees and would like to put a stop on the efforts of controversial individuals in order to influence the upcoming U.S. Presidential election and its prospects. SMCCDI's members have dedicated their efforts to the freedom of Iran, and dealt with the war against Islamic terror, rather than amassing a fortune and illegitimate fame on the backs of the Iranian people.

SMCCDI and its Coordinator are also reserving the right of counter suing Hassan Nemazee for libelous, truly Malicious and intentionally acts, conspiracy, and having caused psychological damages to some of the Movement's members, especially some of the brave NGO recognized students who are fighting against tyranny and terror in Iran and are worried about the future of the Movement's operations in the US.

A SMCCDI Urgent Action Call, seeking financial and legal support from all freedom lovers, democracy advocates and principled Iranians and Americans, shall be issued in the next few days and prior to the juridical deadline of May 10th by which date SMCCDI must have found a lawyer and shall depose a contrary argument beside the Harris County Court, in order to avoid shutting down its valuable operations.

Copies of more existing documents, than mentioned in the above text, are available for the members of Press upon written request send to: smccdi@daneshjoo.org

For info call: (214) 906-8181

http://www.daneshjoo.org/generalnews/article/publish/article_5957.shtml

[DoctorZIn]

Cleric's Torture Ban Recognises Iran's Record

April 29, 2004
The Guardian
Dan De Luce

The head of the Iranian judiciary issued an order yesterday banning the use of torture and other abuses: an unprecedented acknowledgement of the regime's record of repression.

"Any torture to extract a confession is banned and the confessions extracted through torture are not legitimate and legal," Ayatollah Mahmoud Hashemi Shahrudi's order to the police, judges and intelligence officials says.

The 15-point directive says the "blindfolding, restraining, pestering and insulting of detainees must be avoided during arrest, interrogation and investigation".

The order merely reiterates rights contained in the Iranian constitution, but it amounts to confirmation by a leading member of the theocracy of rampant legal abuses.

"There have been some implicit words before, but explicitly in an order, this is the first time," said Reza Yousefian, a reformist MP in the outgoing parliament.

"We should welcome this kind of order, regardless of the motivation behind it."

He said it seemed that the conservative establishment, which won back control of the parliament in the disputed elections in February, wished to present a more moderate face domestically and to European governments.

Echoing the view of human rights lawyers, he said he doubted that the order would be fully carried out. But the public declaration represented some kind of step forward.

The order coincides with a visit to Iran by British judges, and recent court decisions that adopted a relatively lenient approach to journalists accused of insulting state officials.

It says the accused has the right to a lawyer, must be detained only on the basis of clear legal charges and must be given the chance to verify written confessions.

Families should be informed of a defendant's legal status, detainees should not be taken to secret locations, and only relevant documents and material should be confiscated by the police.

Such fundamental civil rights are regularly denied to political activists, students, journalists and others who dare to criticise the ruling clergy publicly.

In violation of the constitution and the directive, the regime continues to hold more than 30 political prisoners in the notorious Evin prison in north Tehran, and an unknown number of dissidents in other jails.

Iran's largely powerless moderate president, Mohammad Khatami, acknowledged as much in comments published yesterday by the English-language daily Iran. "Absolutely, we do have political prisoners. There are those who are in prison for their beliefs," he was quoted as saying.

Meeting young people on Tuesday, he described Iran as part of a region that had failed to fulfil aspirations for freedom and democracy. "We are living in the east and face despotic governments, humiliating societies and centuries of destroyed hopes," he said.

Last week the UN human rights commission chose for the second year running not to censure Iran, which conservative newspapers greeted as a vindication of the republic.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/iran/story/0,12858,1205446,00.html

[DoctorZIn]

Britain Fails to Issue Visa for Senior Iranian Reformist Official

April 29, 2004
Khaleej Times Online
DPA

TEHERAN - Britain failed to issue an entry visa on time for a senior Iranian reformist official to go to London when he wanted to, the government newspaper Iran reported on Thursday.

Mohsen Mirdamadi, head of parliament’s foreign policy commission, had applied for a visa at the British embassy in Teheran in order to accompany another MP to London for medical purposes, the report said.

But his visa did not arrive in Teheran on time, forcing Mirdamadi to cancel the visit.

A British embassy spokeswoman in Teheran said that London has not yet replied to the visa request but, as far the embassy was concerned, the process for the visa was still underway.

Mirdamadi has been one of the main Iranian officials with whom almost all visiting European foreign ministers have held talks in the last four years.

http://www.khaleejtimes.com/DisplayArticle.asp?xfile=data/middleeast/2004/April/middleeast_April917.xml&section=middleeast&col=

[DoctorZIn]

Ancient Persian Scratch Pads Going Back to Iran from U. of C.

April 29, 2004
Chicago Sun-Times
Dave Newbart

Common workers received rations of a quart and a half of barley per day, plus half a quart of beer or wine. New mothers got more, while members of the royal family got much more than they could possibly devour on their own.

These small details on the daily goings-on in the Persian empire 2,500 years ago are carved on clay tablets that have been at the University of Chicago's Oriental Institute since 1937, on loan from Iran.

Though many of the tablets have been studied intensely, the U. of C. hasn't been able to return to Iran to give back the tablets since the Iranian revolution in 1979 essentially shut that nation's borders to Americans.

On Wednesday, however, the university announced it was sending a delegation to Iran next month to return 300 of the tablets. The move comes after Iranian officials invited scholars from all over the world to a conference last August in hopes of reopening the door to such exchange.

"They placed scholarship over politics,'' said Gil Stein, director of the Oriental Institute, who said the U. of C. is the first university to respond in kind. "This will be the first return of cultural material since the Iranian revolution.''

It makes sense for Iran to re-establish those contacts, particularly with the U. of C., which has the biggest repository of the tablets from this time period in the world. Between 1933 and 1939, the institute brought back 15,000 to 30,000 tablets and fragments from excavations at the ancient city of Persepolis in central Iran, said Matthew Stolper, a professor of Assyriology.

Oriental Institute scholar Richard Hallock spent 40 years translating the tablets, written in a form of wedge-shaped or cuneiform writing called Elamite. He published in-depth research on 2,100 of them. In 1948 and 1951, the school returned about half of its collection, Stolper said. In all, the institute has analyzed about 15 percent of the tablets, Stolper said.

The U. of C. has two people on staff -- out of a total of a dozen in the world -- who can still read the tablets, including Stolper. In all of Iran, there is only one person fluent in the language used on the tablets, and he is nearing retirement, officials said. (He also studied at the U.ofC. in the 1970s.) There are no official programs to study the language in Iran, Stein said.

As part of a new research agreement with Iran, the U. of C. hopes to bring Iranians to the Oriental Institute to learn the language and study the tablets, Stein said.

Stolper said those tablets contain "frightening detail'' on the inner workings of the Persian empire, which was the largest in the world up until that point and included Ethiopia, Egypt, Greece, Central Asia and India. The tablets are largely administrative records, documenting ration distribution around the region, but also include legal records and notes when major visitors came to the area. They also helped researchers learn names of regional Persian leaders.

But the tablets are hard to read, largely because of the style of writing, Stolper said, and scholars don't agree on exactly what they say.

http://www.suntimes.com/output/news/cst-nws-iran29.html

[DoctorZIn]

Cleric Flick Captivates Iran

April 29, 2004
BBC News
Sadeq Saba

A satirical Iranian movie depicting the life of a convicted criminal who disguises himself as a cleric has become a box-office hit in Iran. The film, Marmoulak (The Lizard), was originally scheduled to be screened in late March during the Iranian new year holidays.

But the authorities found the message of the film offensive to the clergy and ordered it to be banned.

Later they allowed it to be screened with some cuts.

The film follows the fortunes of Reza Marmoulak - Reza the Lizard - a convicted thief who disguises himself as a Muslim cleric to escape from prison.

He then discovers the benefits of life as a preacher under Iran's clerical rule.

On his way to the border to leave the country illegally, he arrives in a village where the people have been waiting for a cleric to lead their Friday sermons.

Reza the Lizard becomes their popular religious leader and captivates their imagination by his simplicity and brings worshippers flocking back to the mosques.

Clerics angered

So one message of the film is that even a convicted criminal could go through a moral transformation and find God himself.

But what has probably angered conservative clerics is the underlying criticism of their privileged position in society.

Hardliners are also uncomfortable with the prospect of a criminal acting as a cleric and a mullah who does not know much about Islam and jokes with the worshippers.

Mocking clerics is a taboo under the Islamic government and The Lizard is the first film to cross this red line.

The director of the film, Kamal Tabrizi, has said that the clergy must understand that in order to be able to survive they should accept criticism.

Film critics say that The Lizard is one of the funniest films ever made in Iran about the clergy and they predict that it could become one of the most commercially successful Iranian films of all time.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/middle_east/3661091.stm

[DoctorZIn]

Mentor in Iran keeps distance from radical anti-US Iraqi cleric Sadr

by Siavosh Ghazi and Laurent Lozano

QOM, Iran, April 29 (AFP) - Radical Iraqi Shiite Muslim cleric Moqtada Sadr's mentor in Iran, Grand Ayatollah Kazem Hossein Haeri, denies Sadr has the right to wage a "jihad" holy war against coalition forces in Iraq in his name.
At least that was the word from the Iraqi ayatollah's brother and spokesman, Mohammed Hossein Haeri, in an interview with AFP. Haeri, himself a cleric, was also unwilling to confirm reports that the young firebrand Sadr was the ayatollah's representative in Iraq.

"For us to approve of the activities of Moqtada Sadr, he would need to coordinate with our office in Najaf, something he has not been doing," said the brother of the ayatollah who lives in the holy city of Qom, central Iran.

"Neither Ayatollah Haeri nor any other Iraqi religious leader has declared jihad. So one cannot attack the occupation forces, unless they attack Iraqis, then they have the right to defend themselves," he said.

Some in the US military, which has clashed repeatedly with Sadr's Mehdi Army followers, contend the ayatollah is an inspiration behind the deadly Shiite revolt in Iraq and even a voice of Iranian policy.

Tehran is on record as calling for stability in its western neighbour and has also kept its distance from Sadr, although it shares his goal of foreign forces being withdrawn from Shiite majority Iraq.

Sadr's militia is being armed by some parties within the Islamic Republic of Iran, according to the Americans. Grand Ayatollah Haeri, 65, has been living in exile since 1976.

In Iraq, he was a leader of the Dawa party, and then took a leading role in the Supreme Council for the Islamic Revolution in Iraq (SCIRI), which was Iran-based but has become the main party in post-Saddam Iraq.

The ayatollah has officially given up active politics to concentrate on religious teaching. Dozens of young Iraqi pilgrims flock to his office each day and collect copies of his "opinions" on Islam."The Americans must leave Iraq as soon possible. How can we accept a Muslim country being governed by infidels?" he asks.

His brother said the ayatollah does not send any instructions to Sadr, but only replies to questions. Sadr, who is wanted by the Americans in connection with the murder last year of a moderate rival cleric, has visited Qom himself and carries strong credentials as a son of the late Ayatollah Mohammed Sadegh al-Sadr.

The two ayatollahs were friends, until Sadr was assassinated by the regime of Saddam Hussein.Mohammed Hussein Haeri said that Sadr and the most influential Shiite leader in Iraq, Grand Ayatollah Ali Al-Sistani, a moderate, while poles apart, were both important for the Iraqi people."Ayatollah Haeri cannot decide between the parties," explained analyst Hassan Hashemian.

"He is basically on the same wavelength as the Iranians. In private, they do not hide their satisfaction at seeing the Americans in the quagmire of Iraq as Moqtada Sadr complicates their job," he said.

According to the brother, Ayatollah Haeri has not decided to return to Iraq. "The farther you are from the (American) enemy, the more effective you can be," he reasoned.

http://www.iranmania.com/news/290404e.asp

[DoctorZIn]

Terrorists cheer Kerry's rhetoric

Officials think al-Qaida will plan attacks in U.S. to force out Bush

Posted: April 29, 2004
1:00 a.m. Eastern

By J. Michael Waller
© 2004 Insight/News World Communications Inc.

Sen. John Kerry's increasingly shrill challenge of President Bush is grinding down the image of the United States abroad and playing directly into the hands of anti-U.S. extremists.

Exploiting the liberties of free societies, terrorists are using the mass media to sow divisions among and within the democracies, terrorism experts report.

The March bombing of the Madrid subway proved that low-budget terrorist attacks could be used to influence democratic elections and, by virtue of Spain's sudden military withdrawal from Iraq, to drive wedges between the staunchest allies in the international antiterrorism coalition.

Senior Spanish and U.S. officials now believe al-Qaida will plan more attacks in the United States to try to force President Bush from office.

Playing directly into the terrorists' hands is Bush's increasingly shrill challenger, Kerry. Democracies long have been vulnerable to manipulation by hostile foreign powers.

President George Washington foresaw this in his Farewell Address of 1796. Though the popular notion is that the main point of the address was to warn against entangling alliances, the most persistent theme of Washington's speech was to warn against foreign subversion of America's democratic process.

In his words, "It is easy to foresee that from different causes and from different quarters much pains will be taken, many artifices employed," to undermine the national identity and sense of purpose.

Specifically, Washington feared that foreign adversaries would use the new democratic system to turn Americans against themselves.

Even now, external enemies are attacking the political fortress of the United States and its democratic allies through propaganda by word and deed.

In his taped statement aired on the Wahhabi satellite TV network Al-Jazeera on April 15, Osama bin Laden not only sought to divide Europe from the United States by offering a "truce" with European countries that pull out of the coalition in Iraq, the al-Qaida leader also explicitly feasted on the feeding frenzy among bickering American politicians about whether President Bush was to blame for the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks.

Good propagandists will turn their enemies' words against them, and the best will sow suspicion and division among them. This is happening now in the United States, where the terrorist enemy and its allies are using the rhetoric of the current presidential campaign in their jihad against the nation.

Straying from healthy debate

Previous cautions against rash campaign words that provide aid and comfort to the enemy were thrown out the window long ago. Kerry steadily has become more and more shrill in his denunciations of the president as a leader, a man and a politician.

Straying from legitimate policy differences with Bush or a healthy national debate about how best to fight the terrorist enemy, the Democratic nominee in waiting has yanked off the safety and fired full auto at the president.

Al-Jazeera and other anti-U.S. propaganda outlets have been quick to magnify whatever Kerry says in an attempt to show what a failure the United States has become under the Bush presidency.

Kerry's increasingly strident and careless statements on the campaign trail reverberate abroad. His foul-mouthed interview with Rolling Stone became part of an Al-Jazeera feature on March 16. Although Kerry voted to let the Iraq war go forward, the Wahhabi-owned TV network noted, "He has suggested Bush's handling of the campaign is 'f-ed up.'"

"Bush misled Americans on the degree Iraq posed a threat," Kerry said in the Al-Jazeera broadcast, and the president is not "working closely enough with the international community."

Bush's exclusion of France and Germany from competition for U.S. taxpayer-funded contracts to rebuild Iraq, Kerry said, was "dumb and insulting."

Al-Jazeera rebroadcast, in Arabic, Kerry's allegation that in combating terrorist structures inside the United States, Bush and the Department of Justice have smeared "innocent Muslims and Arabs who pose no danger."

Such words, one of Kerry's former Senate colleagues says, grind down the image of the United States abroad and damage Washington's efforts to maintain allies and supporters in the Arabic-speaking world. With near-daily doses of extreme and careless quotations from the anti-Bush camp, Arab audiences are led to believe the worst about U.S. intentions and policies in the war on terrorism.

Rather than helping the war effort with positive alternatives to counterterrorist policies they consider flawed, Kerry and other politicians are fanning the flames of hostility in the Islamic world.

The government-controlled press in Syria generally ignored President Bush's State of the Union address in January, "but on its front pages highlighted criticism that came in its wake, particularly Democratic presidential candidate John Kerry's calling Bush's [foreign] policy 'arrogant and inept,'" according to the Middle East Media Research Institute, which monitors Middle Eastern news and propaganda organizations and publishes translations and analyses in English.

Even in Jordan, an Arab kingdom that has been an ally in the war against the terrorists, the editor of the Al-Arab Al-Yaum newspaper commented, "When President Bush gave his address, to hearty applause by his party in Congress, the Democrats shook their heads in condemnation."

The Kerry campaign, meanwhile, is reported to have e-mailed messages to foreign media outlets, pledging to "repair the damage" that President Bush allegedly has inflicted on the world.

The Tehran Times, an English-language newspaper in the Iranian capital, reported Feb. 8 that unnamed Kerry staffers sent an e-mail to the Tehran-based Mehr News Agency apologizing for the conduct of the United States in the war on terrorism and saying that Kerry is the man to make things new again.

"Disappointment with current U.S. leadership is widespread, extending not just to the corridors of power and politics but to the man and woman on the street as well," the message said. "We also remain convinced that John Kerry has the best chance of beating the incumbent in November and putting America on a new course that will lead to a safer, more secure and more stable world."

The Kerry campaign has claimed that all of this was the work of overseas Democrats and cannot be laid at the door of its candidate.

Radical sheik picks up theme

But recent statements from Sheik Moqtada al-Sadr, the extremist Iran-backed Shiite cleric whose guerrilla army has been killing U.S. soldiers and Marines, appear to echo this and some of Bush's other Democratic critics. Within 48 hours of Sen. Edward M. Kennedy's, D-Mass., first major characterization of Iraq as "another Vietnam," al-Sadr picked up the theme.

Soon after Kerry denounced Halliburton, the oil company formerly headed by Vice President Dick Cheney, bin Laden singled out the firm. "I stopped briefly at a gas station," Kerry said on March 30. "If prices stay that high, Dick Cheney and President Bush are going to have to carpool to work. Those aren't Exxon prices, they are Halliburton prices."

In his recording released two weeks later, according to a MEMRI translation, bin Laden denounced major corporations but named only Halliburton: "This war makes millions of dollars for big corporations, either weapons manufacturers or those working in the reconstruction [of Iraq], such as Halliburton and its sister companies."

Former Sen. Fred Thompson, R-Tenn., observed in a recent Washington Post commentary: "Instead of trying to chart a path of progress, many of the president's critics have devoted themselves to fomenting public despair over a war, which they keep repeating, should never have been fought. At the same time critics of the Bush administration insist it should have done more to combat al-Qaida in Afghanistan before Sept 11."

Thompson added, "They miss the more profound lesson that national tragedy should have instilled: that the only deterrent to terrorism is strength and that weakness – real and perceived – is an incitement to further attacks."

The steady, daily attacks on the war and the motivations behind it, Thompson warns, risk undermining the strong international position of the United States and turning it into one of weakness.

"Weakness is when America's leaders compare Iraq to Vietnam, announcing to the world a faltering resolve to see our mission through."

This signal, Thompson argues, causes wartime allies to lose heart.

"To our allies in the Middle East and beyond, these predictions of defeat send a clear and chilling message to hedge their bets, because the United States cannot be counted on. And to our enemies, they can send an equally clear message: You can win."

Madrid model

Al-Qaida may be planning to influence the American presidential elections this November, replicating the "Madrid model" of staging bloody terrorist attacks to intimidate voters into ousting leaders who aggressively fight terrorism.

Some observers believe that its March 11 train bombings in Madrid, which created an electoral backlash against Spanish Prime Minister Jose Maria Aznar three days later, validated a model by which the terrorists could influence democratic societies to get rid of their tough-on-terrorism leaders.

Among the United States' staunchest European allies, Aznar was one of the original European supporters of ousting Saddam Hussein. All pre-electoral polls showed his party winning re-election against Socialist Party candidate Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero. But the subway bombings, which killed nearly 200 and injured more than 1,800, shook the confidence of the Spanish people and was the single largest factor in Zapatero's surprise victory.

"The terrorists won," according to Bob Brinker, a financial analyst and host of the syndicated radio program MoneyTalk. Watching how political events shape the markets, Brinker coined the term "Madrid model" in expectation of future attacks designed to manipulate the outcome of elections.

In Brinker's view, under the Madrid model the terrorists attack a democratic society, change the government and gain a military victory in Iraq by helping democratic antiwar politicians come to power.

Brinker calls Zapatero an "al-Qaida-installed prime minister."

"Can you imagine the empowerment that al-Qaida feels today?" Brinker said on his April 18 program. He predicted a repeat performance for the U.S. presidential election in November: "This is the last thing in the world you want to see happen."

Neither Kerry nor his ally Kennedy seems to have learned from his own Vietnam experiences, say critics, when both used extremist rhetoric to sow defeatism at home even though U.S. and South Vietnamese forces were destroying the communist enemy on the ground.

As in Vietnam, the Kerry camp seems not to care. The very day bin Laden's tape was broadcast, Kerry stood in East Rutherford, N.J., accusing the president of manipulating the war for personal political gain.

"Everything he did in Iraq, he's going to try to persuade people it has to do with terror even though everybody here knows that it has nothing whatsoever to do with al-Qaida and everything to do with an agenda that they had preset, determined," Kerry said.

Islamist forces are not alone in using Kerry's words against the United States. North Korean dictator Kim Jong-il, whose regime is on the State Department's list of state sponsors of terrorism, also favors a new American president. The regime's mouthpieces, including the Communist Party daily Rodong Sinmun, have been using Kerry's statements as propaganda to discredit the U.S. government.

"North Korea has been paying keen attention to the U.S. presidential election in recent weeks, reporting Democratic presidential primaries and various opinion polls through its state media," the English-language Korea Times, published in Seoul, reported in February. "Most of the reports are focusing on the criticism against Bush and Sen. John Kerry's surge as viable presidential candidate."

Rebecca MacKinnon, former Beijing bureau chief for CNN and now a media fellow at Harvard University's John F. Kennedy School of Government, says that North Korea's state-controlled media have been portraying Kerry "in a positive light."

As the Financial Times reported in February, "In the past few weeks, speeches by the Massachusetts senator have been broadcast on Radio Pyongyang and reported in glowing terms by the Korea Central News Agency, the official mouthpiece of Mr. Kim's communist regime. ... 'Senator Kerry, who is seeking the presidential candidacy of the Democratic Party, sharply criticized President Bush, saying it was an ill-considered act to deny direct dialogue with North Korea,' said the news agency. ... Pyongyang's friendly attitude toward Mr. Kerry contrasts with its strong anti-Bush rhetoric."

Like other wartime enemies of the United States, al-Qaida is relying on presumably unwitting allies in the international peace movements. In his April 15 tape, bin Laden called the antiwar demonstrations a "positive interaction" and cited "opinion polls which indicate that most European people want peace."

He appeared to view the Spanish public's ouster of conservative Prime Minister Jose Maria Aznar in favor of an anti-U.S. socialist, Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero, as a sign of weakness in the West.

That component of strategy is nothing new. The North Vietnamese regime relied heavily on American antiwar protesters to undermine the national will and defeat the U.S. military through political means, in ways that Hanoi could not win on the battlefield.

The present North Korean regime is following suit, propaganda specialists say. Providing the ideological inspiration for a strong section of the antiwar movement through its loyal political allies in the United States and elsewhere, the regime of Kim Jong-il continues to use the old Soviet active-measures model of international political warfare.

The Workers World Party, a small, numerically insignificant but organizationally superior group based in New York City, slavishly supports the policies of the North Korean government, and its leaders frequently visit Pyongyang. One of its front groups, International ANSWER, coordinates the largest peace protests in the United States.

Pyongyang continually exhorts the peace movement around the world. On Feb. 4 the official North Korean Communist Party paper Rodong Sinmun said, "The antiwar struggle is the main form of the struggle for world peace at present and its principal target is the United States."

The paper continued, "It is impossible to avert a war and achieve the world peace without a struggle against the U.S. imperialists. ... The people of all countries of the world should lift their antiwar, anti-U.S. voices and bind Yankees hand and foot to keep them from starting a war."

Later in February, in a more subdued tone, Rodong Sinmun cited Kerry as a more preferable leader than Bush. U.S. national-security leaders have long recognized how the terrorists exploit our democratic system, but have been slow to counter it effectively.

Insight obtained a copy of a U.S. Army intelligence briefing titled "Al-Qaida's Use of the Mass Media in Infowar/Netwar." Referring to information warfare, IW – the use of information and information systems as instruments of conflict –and the social or societal IW medium called netwar, the Army report is based on two years of assessments of more than 200 documents.

Little secret intelligence is needed to understand al-Qaida's strategy. Open-source information can meet up to 85 percent of the terrorists' intelligence-information needs, according to the report.

Public information "provides understanding of strategic plans and intentions [and is] especially useful in forecasting cultural turmoil and societal upheavals, and in planning/conducting IW operations," according to the Army briefing. "AQ [al-Qaida] is familiar with the art of war, but U.S. military has ignored past lessons in favor of technology, and is ignorant of its current foe," the report says.

Part of al-Qaida's "counterpropaganda strategy," according to the Army report, is to "turn people's eyes toward their leaders to put enemy [U.S. and coalition partners] on defensive, and take the initiative to affect public opinion."

That is nothing new to students of history and statecraft. George Washington devoted much of his Farewell Address to the need to defend the country against foreign subversion designed to corrupt the national identity. He recognized the difficult situation that "real patriots" who resist foreign intrigues "are liable to become suspected and odious," while those espousing "pretended patriotism" – what he called "tools and dupes" of foreign interests – "usurp[ed] the applause and confidence of the people to surrender their interests."

http://www.worldnetdaily.com/news/article.asp?ARTICLE_ID=38247

[DoctorZIn]

UK Agrees To Sell Military Parts To Iran

April 29, 2004
Dow Jones News Wires
The Associated Press

LONDON -- The U.K. has made an exception to its embargo on arms sales to Iran to ship aircraft components to the country, the government said Thursday.

Foreign Office Minister Bill Rammell said the government was satisfied the parts, originally designed for military aircraft engines, would be put to civilian use in turbines that power pumps for oil and gas pipelines.

"The government is satisfied that there is a minimal risk of diversion to a military end use, and is prepared to make an exception to the U.K. national arms embargo," he said in a written statement.

The U.K. has had an embargo on arms sales to Iran since 1993.

http://online.wsj.com/public/us

[DoctorZIn]

Political Problems
Panic as policy?

By Michael Ledeen
April 29, 2004, 9:37 a.m.
NRO

The root cause of our problems in Iraq is an excessively narrow vision, which has blinded us to the real strategic context, and therefore left us running after epiphenomena instead of developing a proper policy and a sensible mission. Nonetheless, our overwhelming military superiority has, so far, at least, made it possible for us to overcome a series of potential crises.

Like many others, I would have preferred our armed forces to pursue the murderers of the four security men, and to arrest or destroy them and their henchmen in Fallujah. Like Michael Rubin, I agree that the delay discouraged the long-suffering Iraqis and tortured them with the terrible thought that the son of Bush may yet betray them as his father did. But we are now closing in on the terrorists in Fallujah, and I have every confidence that we will destroy them in short order. (By the way, if you want to read a really good analysis of the battle of Fallujah, rather than endure the rantings of various retired officers and armchair generals, check out www.belmontclub.blogspot.com).

Meanwhile, back in Najaf, where the Iranian puppet Moqtada al Sadr took cowardly refuge among the holy shrines of the Shiite faith, there are armed bands in the streets, fighting Moqtada's thugs. As some of us have said all along, the Iraqi Shiites do not like their Iranian cousins very much, and they have never had much esteem for this excessively brash and altogether too-young man who has meager religious standing and precious little culture. Perhaps he will become a casualty of Iraqi Shiite self-assertion, an outcome devoutly to be desired. Perhaps, in the end, the Marines and the special-forces units will have to do it themselves. Perhaps, best of all, all will join to remove the thug. Time will tell. But if we clean up Najaf and Fallujah, the biggest winner will be Ayatollah Sistani, who can then have his cake (the defeat of his enemies) and eat it too (the delay and phony "negotiations" came in no small part at his request).

So while, as usual in human events, these things could and should have been done better, we are nonetheless moving in the right direction in the ground war. The more serious blunders are political, as they have been since well before Operation Iraqi Freedom. We should have prepared the political battleground before the fighting ever started, by creating a democratic Iraqi government-in-exile. But internal divisions within the Bush administration proved intractable, and future historians will no doubt marvel at the fact that more passion and more man hours were spent fighting Ahmed Chalabi and the Iraqi National Congress than combating the likes of Moqtada and the remnants of Saddam's security forces. Indeed, the internal battle consumed countless hours in recent weeks, as is demonstrated by the cascade of anti-Chalabi leaks from his many mortal enemies at the Department of State and the Central Intelligence Agency.

Thus paralyzed with regard to one of the central issues of our time — how best to support newly freed countries in the Middle East — we have been coping with the bane of modern government, namely the morning news. One has the impression that the CPA, even Viceroy Bremer himself, constantly seeks to remedy whatever bad news hits the popular press, rather than carrying out a thoughtful policy. Thus, when the dual unpleasantness of Najaf and Fallujah dominated the headlines, we responded in two missteps: first caving in to the outrageous demands of the U.N.'s Lakhtar Brahimi (best known in the region for delivering the Lebanese people to Syrian tyranny in 1989) and then announcing we would welcome Baathists back to positions of authority (in truth, the appeasement of the Baathists had started months ago, most notably in the north, where the media darling, General Petreus, had encouraged the creation of a municipal government with an overwhelming majority of Baathists).

The depth of Iraqi revulsion at these two intemperate decisions can be probed by looking at the better Iraqi blogs (like Iraq the Model, or Hammorabi, or Iraq & Iraqis). We had proclaimed that we were going to liberate the country from Saddam's tyranny, but we now say that the Baathists must have a share of power. Worse yet, after slowly and painfully constructing a transitional government, we then shrug our collective shoulders and turn over the enterprise to the United Nations, best known in Iraq for its intimate embrace of Saddam, its blatant theft of tens of billions of dollars from the "crude-for-food" program, and its cowardice under fire. Do not forget, for the Iraqis most certainly do not, that Kofi Annan's minions ran away after the first bombs directed at their offices, or that Kofi Annan's son is on the list of beneficiaries of "crude for food."

All of which bespeaks panic, rather than thoughtful policy. The goal of American policy — in the eloquent words of President Bush — is the democratization of the Middle East, and democracy means that the people choose their leaders. Our panicky decisions suggested that we were not serious, that we reserved to ourselves the right to make all those decisions, even in the last days of Coalition hegemony. There was no urgent reason for us to make those decisions, indeed they should have been left to the Iraqis. If the Iraqi government decides to give jobs to Baathists, so be it; the officials of that government will have to submit to the electoral judgment of their own people. And the people, not the United Nations, should choose the Iraqi government.

There were indeed decisions that the Coalition, and the American government, should have made. Some were, and some weren't. It seems that there is still a lot of money in the kitty for "reconstruction," and you can be sure that there is no shortage of entrepreneurial companies willing and able to come to Iraq and start work, despite the scary security situation. The CPA has been slow to reconstruct, as it has been slow to get reliable news media on the air in Iraq, although that is now moving forward, to Bremer's credit. But, to his shame, the Nuremberg process has not even begun, and that process is arguably the single-most important thing in building a viable Iraqi democracy. You want the rule of law? Then haul the miscreants of the Saddam tyranny in front of a judge and jury, and prosecute them. How can it be that, more than a full year after the fall of Saddam, not a single top Baathist has been brought to justice? (And why, now that you ask, have our media not been pounding this drum? Perhaps because some of them have employed former officials of Saddam's information ministry, a dirty little secret that helps understand many things)?

It would seem intuitively obvious that the rule of law is the bedrock of democracy, and that we should have devoted energy and passion to getting the process under way. Which brings us back to another failure: An Iraqi judge issued an arrest warrant for Moqtada six months ago, yet he was never arrested. We judged that he was losing popularity (I agree) and that time was working against him (yes), and hence we should just let events take their course (wrong). And then, again in what seems a panicky decision, we decided to shut down his newspaper, but leaving him at large.

If we had been true to our principles, we would have enforced the arrest warrant. And if we had a proper understanding of the region, we would have realized that any move against him was bound to provoke a swarm of angry hornets. We cannot "solve" Iraq's problems by acting solely within the confines of the nation, because at least three other terror masters of some significance — Iran, Syria, and Saudi Arabia — are fighting for their survival in Iraq. Against us. Moqtada is an Iranian creature, and Iran has long since created a huge network inside Iraq, ready to respond to orders from Tehran. The model is Lebanon in the Eighties and Nineties, a combination of (suicidal and other) terrorism, insurrection, hostage taking, religious indoctrination, and blackmail. They thoughtfully announced their intentions even before we set boot in Iraq, but our misnamed intelligence community thought they didn't mean it. Thus we were unprepared for March and April, and thus I suspect we are largely unprepared for the next big wave, which will come both before and after the turnover of power in late June and early July. I am told that preparations are under way for large-scale operations against the Coalition in Karbala, the second of the Shiite centers.

Our military men are indeed superb, and I think the battle of Fallujah will turn out to be a minor masterpiece of tactical brilliance and human courage. But it is unfair to reward these great fighters with policies invented from one day to the next. The global war on terror requires clear definition, a serious policy, and a strategic plan, which is then applied systematically by all elements of the government. That plan must be regional, at a minimum, and it must include regime change in Syria and Iran, along with a meaningful change of policy in the Saudi kingdom. I am told that the Saudis are now shaken by al Qaeda attacks within their borders, and are begging for help from us. If true, our help must be conditional on the termination of Saudi assistance to terrorists, and to those who man the terror assembly line in the radical mosques and schools spread throughout the West.

There is no shortage of wisdom in this administration, and our leaders should have learned by now not to listen to the whispers of British, Saudi, and European diplomats when they tell us that the Palestinian question is the only thing that really matters, and that we should show understanding for the sensitivities of our enemies, rather than show indifference to their whining because we know they are trying to kill us.

Remember one of the early dicta of Machiavelli: If you are victorious, everyone will judge your methods to have been appropriate. If you lose, you're a bum.

Faster, please.

http://nationalreview.com/ledeen/ledeen200404290937.asp

[DoctorZIn]

Violent clashes rock south Tehran

SMCCDI (Information Service)
Apr 29, 2004

Violent clashes rocked, Shahr e Rey, the southern poor suburb of Tehran opposing brutal militiamen to hundreds of protesters. The popular protest started by today's mid morning and resulted in clashes following the intervention of the regime forces by late afternoon.

Clubs, chains and tear gas were used in order to smash the rally which started peacefully against the official corruption and various financial malversations in the Orchid Town's Development & Management funds by the local authorities.

The regime's troops first stayed afar, contenting to film the demonstrators but intervened by end of afternoon by witnessing the constant increase of the protesters w ho started to shout slogans against the regime and its leaders, including Ali Khamenei.

In retaliation to the brutal attack, the demonstrators set tires ablaze and blocked the two southern beltlines of the Capital. Pieces of stones and Molotov Cocktails responded to the brutal aggression resulting in several injured among demonstrators and the regime forces.

Several anti-riot and patrol vehicles were damaged during the clashes.

The situation in the area is very tense and more protest actions are expected, tomorrow, as thousands of Iranian workers are intending to protest against their poor conditions.

http://www.daneshjoo.org/smccdinews/article/publish/article_4203.shtml

[DoctorZIn]

Tehran's Air Defense Shoots at Ghosts

SMCCDI (Information Service)
Apr 29, 2004

Millions of Tehran's residents rushed, this evening, into the streets and onto the top of their roofs when Tehran's Air Defense System suddenly started firing into a clear sky. Many, fearing bombing or missile attack, went to bomb shelters as they did during the 1980-1988 war with Iraq. Dense firings were reported in some areas of the capital reminding residents of the Iran-Iraq war and the nightly jets or missile attacks by Saddam's forces which killed hundreds and injured untold thousands.

No official explanation has been given for the air-defense display, or exercise. Recent rumors of UFO sightings may have triggered the dangerous reaction to an unknown threat, or possible training exercise. Firing any type of ordnance into the sky always introduces the possibility that expended munitions will return to the ground and ignite fires, or harm innocents.

In reality, many believe that the so-called UFOs might be foreign reconnaissance flights and the Islamic regime will misinform the public about the true reason for the air defense show of force. The regime's leaders fear that any news that Iran is under attack by U.S. forces might degenerate into massive protest demonstrations that could result in the overthrow the theocratic regime

http://www.daneshjoo.org/smccdinews/article/publish/article_4202.shtml

[DoctorZIn]

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