Iranian Alert -- July 17, 2004 [EST]-- IRAN LIVE THREAD -- "Americans for Regime Change in Iran"

The US media still largley ignores news regarding the Islamic Republic of Iran. As Tony Snow of the Fox News Network has put it, “this is probably the most under-reported news story of the year.” Most American’s are unaware that the Islamic Republic of Iran is NOT supported by the masses of Iranians today. Modern Iranians are among the most pro-American in the Middle East.

There is a popular revolt against the Iranian regime brewing in Iran today. I began these daily threads June 10th 2003. On that date Iranians once again began taking to the streets to express their desire for a regime change. Today in Iran, most want to replace the regime with a secular democracy.

The regime is working hard to keep the news about the protest movement in Iran from being reported. Unfortunately, the regime has successfully prohibited western news reporters from covering the demonstrations. The voices of discontent within Iran are sometime murdered, more often imprisoned. Still the people continue to take to the streets to demonstrate against the regime.

In support of this revolt, Iranians in America have been broadcasting news stories by satellite into Iran. This 21st century news link has greatly encouraged these protests. The regime has been attempting to jam the signals, and locate the satellite dishes. Still the people violate the law and listen to these broadcasts. Iranians also use the Internet and the regime attempts to block their access to news against the regime. In spite of this, many Iranians inside of Iran read these posts daily to keep informed of the events in their own country.

This daily thread contains nearly all of the English news reports on Iran. It is thorough. If you follow this thread you will witness, I believe, the transformation of a nation. This daily thread provides a central place where those interested in the events in Iran can find the best news and commentary. The news stories and commentary will from time to time include material from the regime itself. But if you read the post you will discover for yourself, the real story of what is occurring in Iran and its effects on the war on terror.

I am not of Iranian heritage. I am an American committed to supporting the efforts of those in Iran seeking to replace their government with a secular democracy. I am in contact with leaders of the Iranian community here in the United States and in Iran itself.

If you read the daily posts you will gain a better understanding of the US war on terrorism, the Middle East and why we need to support a change of regime in Iran. Feel free to ask your questions and post news stories you discover in the weeks to come.

If all goes well Iran will be free soon and I am convinced become a major ally in the war on terrorism. The regime will fall. Iran will be free. It is just a matter of time.

Flame of the ancient faith still flickers in Iran
17 July 2004

CHAK CHAK: Zoroastrians say the sacred spring at Chak Chak, a shrine perched beneath a towering cliff face in the searing desert of central Iran, has lost none of its miraculous healing powers.

"A 32-year-old Muslim came here as a last resort when he was dying from leukemia. I was not sure we should let a Muslim in but he insisted and spent the night here," said Goshtasb Belivani, a priest of Iran's ancient pre-Islamic religion.

"During the night he was visited by a beautiful woman dressed in green who gave him sherbet to drink," he continued.

For the last three months, since being given the all clear from his doctor, the young man has been a regular visitor to the shrine.

The beautiful woman was the ghost of Nikbanou, a 7th century Persian princess who fled to the mountain refuge, escaping Arab horsemen who thundered across the border and planted the green pennants of Islam in Iranian soil.

Islam spread quickly in a society where the priestly and royal elite had alienated most classes beneath them.

Now there are only 30,000 followers of the ancient religion among the Islamic Republic's 66 million people, down from 60,000 at the time of the 1979 Islamic revolution.

Zoroastrians see life as an eternal conflict between their good God Ahura Mazda and Ahriman, the embodiment of evil.

Followers of the prophet Zoroaster, who died in the 6th century BC, say the central tenets of their faith are: "Good thoughts, good words, good deeds."

In early summer, Zoroastrians from across the world meet at the shrine where Nikbanou sought refuge. During the scorching daylight hours they doze on rugs, have picnics and attend prayers in the cool grotto shrine around the flame focal to their worship.

Toward evening, the atmosphere gets far more convivial. Young Zoroastrian men in cowboy hats jive away as one of their friends plays catchy tunes on his Yamaha keyboard.

Girls with free-flowing hair, wearing bright dresses, play catch and giggle while prayers in Avestan, the ancient religious language of the Zoroastrians, are read out over a loud-speaker system.

The Islamic Republic's strict rules on dress and wine are relaxed in the private spaces of the religious minorities.

STAY OR EMIGRATE?

Iran's Shi'ite Muslims are generally tolerant of the ancient religion.

"We get on fine, we use each other's shops and chat every day," said Mohammad Ali Karimi, who teaches Islamic history and religion in a primary school in the nearby city of Yazd, 400km southeast of Tehran.

"But many of them are emigrating or becoming Muslims," he added.

The Towers of Silence, the two outcrops where Yazd's Zoroastrians used to leave their dead for the vultures, are now a picnic spot.

Many Zoroastrians at Chak Chak said whole families would convert to Islam if someone married outside the community so they would not be denied inheritance payments under Iranian law.

Zoroastrians have their own member of parliament and hold high positions in bodies such as the Oil Ministry. They say their communities are more vibrant in Canada and Australia.

In India, where they are known as Parsis, the community is more than 60,000 strong.

"Many reckon they will do better as doctors and engineers abroad. If I had a second chance, I would probably emigrate," said priest Esfandiar Dastour, 73.

Former parliamentarian Khosro Dabestani insisted problems for Zoroastrians were the same as those for most Iranians but many disagreed.

Some said friends and family had been denied jobs teaching in universities because they were Zoroastrians. Another mentioned being booted out of a chess team just before reaching national level.

"One Muslim elder confiscated our land in a village I know saying 'This is an Islamic country, the land belongs to us'," said one woman.

Another woman, Golchehreh, protested about dress codes.

"I am not a Muslim, why should I have to wear these headscarves?," she complained.

But gray-bearded Zoroastrian pilgrim Iraj thought they had all missed the point.

"There are no mosques, churches and synagogues. They are all in your own heart," he said.

"This shrine is a sham. You need to be out there alone with your God under the sun in the wilderness," he said, pointing into the shimmering whiteness of the desert.

http://www.stuff.co.nz/stuff/0,2106,2974408a12,00.html

Son of slain photojournalist protests outside Iranian Embassy
Canadian Press
July 16, 200

OTTAWA (CP) - The son of slain photojournalist Zahra Kazemi joined a small but vocal band of protesters at the Iranian Embassy on Friday to demand justice in her murder case.

Stephan Hachemi and about a dozen other demonstrators railed at the embassy with bullhorns and chants from the sidewalk across the street. The noisy protest followed a diplomatic rebuke earlier this week from the federal government.

Ottawa recalled its ambassador to Iran to protest the exclusion of Canadian observers from monitoring the Tehran trial of Kazemi's accused killer.

"It's really the public displaying its anger over this case," Hachemi said.

"We want to make sure we make Zahra Kazemi's case an example so they understand they can't act with impunity against somebody - that human rights are important and they have to be respected."

A pastel portrait of the late Iranian-Canadian photojournalist was placed on the sidewalk facing the embassy building.

Kazemi died last year in Iranian custody after she was arrested outside a Tehran prison.

Iranian authorities at first said Kazemi died of a stroke following her arrest for photographing a protest. They eventually charged an intelligence agent with her beating death.

The incident has strained diplomatic relations.

Iran has insisted the trial will be fair and impartial. But Canada says the secrecy of the proceedings violates international standards and has twice recalled its ambassador in less than a year.

http://www.canada.com/news/national/story.html?id=87775f81-d039-420d-818e-7920d76d76bb

9/11 Commission Finds Ties Between al-Qaeda and Iran

Senior U.S. officials have told TIME that the 9/11 Commission's report will cite evidence suggesting that the 9/11 hijackers had previously passed through Iran

By ADAM ZAGORIN AND JOE KLEIN
Friday, Jul. 16, 2004
Time.com

Next week's much anticipated final report by a bipartisan commission on the origins of the 9/11 attacks will contain new evidence of contacts between al-Qaeda and Iran—just weeks after the Administration has come under fire for overstating its claims of contacts between al-Qaeda and Saddam Hussein's Iraq.

A senior U.S. official told TIME that the Commission has uncovered evidence suggesting that between eight and ten of the 14 "muscle" hijackers—that is, those involved in gaining control of the four 9/11 aircraft and subduing the crew and passengers—passed through Iran in the period from October 2000 to February 2001. Sources also tell TIME that Commission investigators found that Iran had a history of allowing al-Qaeda members to enter and exit Iran across the Afghan border. This practice dated back to October 2000, with Iranian officials issuing specific instructions to their border guards—in some cases not to put stamps in the passports of al-Qaeda personnel—and otherwise not harass them and to facilitate their travel across the frontier. The report does not, however, offer evidence that Iran was aware of the plans for the 9/11 attacks.

The senior official also told TIME that the report will note that Iranian officials approached the al-Qaeda leadership after the bombing of the USS Cole and proposed a collaborative relationship in future attacks on the U.S., but the offer was turned down by bin Laden because he did not want to alienate his supporters in Saudi Arabia.

The Iran-al Qaeda contacts were discovered and presented to the Commissioners near the end of the bipartisan panel's more than year-long investigation into the sources and origins of the 9/11 attacks. Much of the new information about Iran came from al-Qaeda detainees interrogated by the U.S. government, including captured Yemeni al-Qaeda operative Waleed Mohammed bin Attash, who organized the October 2000 attack on the USS Cole, and from as many as 100 separate electronic intelligence intercepts culled by analysts at the NSA. The findings were sent to the White House for review only this week. But Commission members have been hinting for weeks that their report would have some Iran surprises. As the 9/11 Commission's chairman, Thomas Kean, said in June, "We believe....that there were a lot more active contacts, frankly, with Iran and with Pakistan than there were with Iraq."

These findings follow a Commission staff report, released in June, which suggested that al-Qaeda may have collaborated with Hezbollah and its Iranian sponsors in the 1996 bombing of the Khobar Towers, a key American military barracks in Saudi Arabia. Previously, the attack had been attributed only to Hezbollah, with Iranian support. A U.S. indictment of bin Laden filed in 1998 for the bombing of U.S. embassies in Africa said al-Qaeda "forged alliances . . . with the government of Iran and its associated terrorist group Hezbollah for the purpose of working together against their perceived common enemies in the West, particularly the United States." But the Commission comes to no firm conclusion on al-Qaeda's involvement in the Khobar disaster.

Since 9/11 the U.S. has held direct talks with Iran—and through intermediaries including Britain, Switzerland and Saudi Arabia—concerning the fate of scores of al-Qaeda that Iran has acknowleded are in the country, including an unspecified number of senior leaders, whom one senior U.S. official called al-Qaeda's "management council". The U.S. as well as the Saudis have unsuccessfully sought the repatriation of this group, which is widely thought to include Saad bin Laden, the son of Osama bin Laden, as well of other key al-Qaeda figures.

http://www.time.com/time/nation/article/0,8599,664967,00.html

Iranian Revolutionary Guards Enjoy Resurgence

July 16, 2004
The Financial Times
Gareth Smyth

Nearly four weeks after Iranian Revolutionary Guards seized six British marines and two sailors on the wide river separating southern Iran and Iraq, the Iranians have still not returned the digital navigational equipment that would show whether the boats were in Iraqi or Iranian waters.

British officials at first apologised for the craft straying on to the Iranian side. But once Iran freed the eight men, Geoff Hoon, the defence secretary, said they had been snatched from Iraqi waters.

One British official told the FT that the boats - being delivered to Iraqi police - were in shallow water 500m from the border, which is the deepest channel of the river called Shatt al-Arab by Arabs and Arvand Rud by Iranians.

For the Revolutionary Guards (IRGC), the arrest of the British forces was a propaganda coup - showing their growing influence in a wider rightwing resurgence after Iran's reformists lost their parliamentary majority in February's election.

The Shatt al-Arab incident is not the only example of the IRGC flexing its muscles. In May, it used tanks to close Tehran's new international airport on its first day of operation, apparently on the "security" grounds that management had been transferred to a "foreign" Turkish-led consortium.

"Any kind of confrontation and isolation helps keeps the military faction strong," said Saeed Leylaz, a newspaper columnist and senior manager in a government-owned vehicle manufacturer.

Separate from the regular army, the 125,000-strong IRGC sees itself as the stead fast defender of the Islamic revolution and is answerable not to the government of reformist president Mohammad Khatami but to Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, Iran's supreme leader and most powerful figure.

One reformist newspaper estimates that 90 deputies in the 290-strong parliament have a "revolutionary or military background".

The government will remain in reformist hands until at least next June's presidential election when Mr Khatami stands down. The right's growing strength is felt in a shift in the country's atmosphere. The regular early summer crackdown on women wearing "bad hijab" - coats that hug the figure or scarves showing hair - has been sharper than in recent years. A more pressing effect of the rightward trend, say analysts, is in foreign and security policy, where the IRGC and its allies are exploiting tension over Iran's nuclear programme.

After the International Atomic Energy Agency last month passed a critical resolution, Iran has threatened to resume uranium enrichment, which it suspended last year after an agreement with Germany, France and Britain.

The rise of the Iranian right is also complicating the situation in Iraq, where US and some Iraqi officials complain of Iranian "interference" and have recently alleged that Tehran's agents are retraining the militia of Moqtada al-Sadr, the militant Shia cleric.

Other Iraqi politicians dismiss these allegations as the US Central Intelligence Agency disrupting relations between the new Iraqi government and its eastern neighbour.

But Iran's attitude to Mr Sadr is ambiguous. While many Iranian leaders dislike his Arab nationalism, the militant right and some of the conservative media portray him as a Muslim resistance figure fighting US occupation.

Some moderate conservatives argue that the influence of the military right should not be exaggerated, but are showing signs of unease. During the election, Amir Mohebian, a columnist with the conservative Resalat newspaper, expressed in print his own scepticism when the Guardian Council, an Islamic watchdog, barred more than 2,000 reformist candidates.

Analysts also detect a weakening in the position of Hassan Rowhani, head of the Supreme Council of National Security and Iran's main negotiator over last year's nuclear agreement with Europe.

Mr Rowhani has been seen as a likely candidate of the pragmatic conservatives in next June's presidential election.

Just a few days after Mr Rowhani used a rare press conference last month to welcome the sovereign Iraqi government, Ayatollah Khamenei denounced Iraq's new leaders as "lackeys".

http://news.ft.com/servlet/ContentServer?pagename=FT.com/StoryFT/FullStory&c=StoryFT&cid=1087373763325&p=1012571727172

Bomb At Any Cost?

July 16, 2004
AFP
TurkishPress.com

TEHRAN -- One of Iran's top ruling clerics vowed Friday that the Islamic republic will continue to pursue its controversial nuclear programme "at any cost" and is determined to become fully self-sufficiant.

"Even if some officials are taking it easy on gaining the technology, the people will not give up," Ayatollah Ahmad Jannati said in a Friday prayer sermon in Tehran.

"We are resolute. It is worth achieving it at any cost," said Jannati, who head the powerful Guardians Council -- a body that screens all of the Islamic republic's laws and candidates for public office.

"Nuclear technology is the issue of the day, and neither our officials nor our people will give up this scientific growth," he said.

Jannati also reasserted Iran's desire to be independent in its bid to generate nuclear power, including in fully mastering the sensitive nuclear fuel cycle.

"We are now begging Western nuclear know-how by importing what we lack in this field. Once we achieve the technology, we will no longer be in a position where we have to ask," he said.

Iran is currently top of the agenda for the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), which is probing allegations the country is using power generation as a cover for a secret weapons drive.

Tehran insists its programme is solely aimed at meeting the future energy needs of a burgeoning population and freeing up its oil and gas resources for export.

http://www.turkishpress.com/turkishpress/news.asp?ID=22350

Growing sex trade
Only democracy can free women from slavery

Donna M. Hughes
July 15, 2004
iranian.com

Last week, I participated in two events commemorating the July 1999 student uprising in Iran. In Washington, D.C., on July 7, the Committee in Support of Referendum in Iran sponsored a panel discussion in the U.S. Senate, and in Toronto, Canada, on July 8, the Canadian Committee for Democracy in Iran held an outdoor rally. Attached is the text of my speech.

A measure of Islamic fundamentalists' success in controlling society is the depth and totality with which they suppress the freedom and rights of women.

Earlier this year, with the assistance of Iranian democracy activists I gathered information about prostitution and the trafficking of women and girls out of Iran for sexual slavery.

It is impossible to know how many victims there are, but all sources indicate an exponential growth in prostitution in Iran. The sex trade is also international, as thousands of Iranian women and girls have been sold into sexual slavery abroad.

This criminal activity is often conducted with the knowledge and participation of the ruling mullahs. Government officials themselves are involved in trading and sexually abusing women and girls.

Many of the girls come from impoverished rural areas. Drug addiction is epidemic throughout Iran, and some addicted parents sell their children to support their habits. High unemployment - 28 percent for youth 15-29 years of age and 43 percent for women 15-20 years of age - is a serious factor in driving restless youth to accept risky offers for work.

The most popular destinations for victims of trafficking from Iran are the Arab countries in the Persian Gulf. In local newspapers in Iran, a number of cases have been documented.

Police have uncovered a number of prostitution and slavery rings operating from Tehran that sent girls to France, Britain, and Turkey.

In the northeastern Iranian province of Khorasan, local police report that girls are being sold to Pakistani men as sex-slaves. The Pakistani men marry the girls, ranging in age from 12 to 20, and then sell them to brothels in Pakistan. In the southeastern border province of Sistan Baluchestan, thousands of Iranian girls reportedly have been sold to Afghani men. Their whereabouts are unknown.

One factor contributing to the increase in prostitution and the sex slave trade is the number of teen girls who are running away from home. The girls are rebelling against fundamentalist imposed restrictions on their freedom, domestic abuse, and parental drug addictions. Unfortunately, in their flight to freedom, the girls find more abuse and exploitation. Ninety percent of girls who run away from home will end up in prostitution.

In cities, shelters have been set-up to provide assistance for runaways. But there have been documented cases of corrupt officials running these shelters using the girls in their prostitution rings.

Some may think a sex slave trade and clerics acting as pimps are contradictions in a country founded and ruled by religious fundamentalists. In fact, these are not such contradictions. First, exploitation and repression are closely associated with each other and complement each other. Both exist where women, individually or collectively, are denied freedom and rights. Second, the Islamic fundamentalists in Iran are not simply conservative Muslims. Since the 1979 revolution, Iran has been a totalitarian terrorist state. Trafficking of women and girls is just another profitable criminal activity of corrupt officials.

Today, the two greatest threats to rights and well being of women in the world are Islamic fundamentalism and the growing sex trade. The fundamentalists in Iran are the chief sponsors of first of these threats, and leading practitioners of second.

Since I wrote an article about prostitution and the trade in women and girls in Iran, a number of people have written to me asking what can be done to stop this trade and assist the victims.

The answer is that only freedom and democracy in Iran can end slavery. Only the overthrow of the mullahs and the defeat of their theocracy will liberate women from a system based on contempt and hatred for women. Only the installation of democracy based on rule of law will rid Iran of the corruption and mafia-like control of Iran. Only individual liberty and equality between men and women will guarantee freedom for women and girls. And only courts of justice will punish the criminal perpetrators for their violence and exploitation.

Of course, we are here today to commemorate the pro-democracy student movement that has courageously demonstrated for just those values and principles. They have heroically stood up to the vicious tyranny in Iran, and many have paid an enormous price for their bravery. Many of those activists have been and are women.

Supporting the bold resistance of these women to the mullahs is the only way to defeat the slave traders and the terrorists. Their voices and lives are essential for establishing a post-terrorist democratic society. Their courage, compassion, and intellect will be needed to help lead a country out of slavery, fear, and corruption.

Those of us with freedom of speech and freedom of association, which are denied to activists in Iran, must use them to support the freedom fighters in Iran. We must work together and lobby our governmental representatives to take positions against the fascist Iranian regime and in support of democracy and freedom. We must tell them that there are no moderate, reformist mullahs in Iran, but there are millions of people who want to be free.

http://www.iranian.com/Women/2004/July/DH/index.html

Washington DC Freepers!!!! Alert!!!

We need your help next Monday!!!

Meet at the "Washington Club"
located at 15 Dupont Circle, N.W. Washington DC 20036,
On July 19th from 08:30 till 11:30 AM.

DoctorZin

More information below:

Denounce "Council on Foreign Relations" meeting in WDC
SMCCDI (Urgent Action)
Jul 16, 2004

Dear Freedom Lovers,

Once again, the pro-Islamic republic's lobby group in the US and few immoral former US officials, are organizing events in order to buy time for the bankrupt and collapsing theocratic regime with the desire to influence the US policy in reference to Iran. This money oriented group which is totally disregarding the Iranians' aspiration for a "Democratic Regime Change in Iran" and Americans' sacrifices in the "War Against Terror & Tyranny", is hoping to legitimize the barbaric Mullahcracy and is targeting resumption of US-Islamic republic ties in case of the election of Senator J. Kerry as a next US President.

Indeed, Dark forces that have been dreaming of George Bush’s defeat are now poised to decide Iran's fate and negotiate Iranians destiny without their presence and consent. They are about to make the kinds of deals that have in the past resulted in tortures and deaths of thousands of Iranians who rose in the name of Freedom, Self Determination, and Independence of Iran.

In this line, a so-called "Iran Task Force" has been created and a launch meeting has been scheduled, in Washington DC, on Monday July 19, 2004, from 08:30 AM till 11:30 AM.

The official responsibles of this illegitimate entity and guest speakers at the meeting are "Zbignew Brzezinski", the National Security Advisor to Jimmy Carter, and "Robert M. Gates, the former CIA Director (1991-93) and current President of Texas A&M University. Maybe It's necessary to remind the lack of intelligence, lucidity and competence of these two individuals who were involved in the two last Democratic administrations of the US and the disastrous consequences of their ill-policies which lead to the rise of Islamism and increase of Terrorism.

IT'S A WELL KNOWN FACT THAT THE ISLAMIC REPUBLIC REGIME IN IRAN IS JUST AS EVIL, REPRESSIVE, AND MURDEROUS AS THE TALEBAN AND THE BAATH REGIMES WERE…

The plight of enslaved Iranians and oppressed Middle Easterners in general notwithstanding, how many more 9/11 types of tragedies would it take to fully realize and accept that far from deserving to be romanced, the terror masters' rule must end?

Would an "Allah u Akbar" chanting suicide bomber’s nuclear blast in middle of Manhattan be convincing enough?

HOW MANY MORE PEOPLE NEED TO DIE BEFORE THEIR CRIES FOR FREEDOM ARE HEARD BY THOSE WHO JUST WANT HEAR CLINKING OF GOLD COINS IN THEIR GROWING STASH AND JUBILANT NOISES OF OFFICIAL FANFARES??? HOW LONG SHOULD WE ALLOW SUCH MASQUERADES TO GO ON IN THE NAME AND DETRIMENT OF IRANIAN AND AMERICAN PEOPLES???

WHERE IS THE OUTRAGE????

Under these Circumstances,

More than ever, you are OBLIGATED to intervene and to denounce such actions at a time that Iranians are subject to the Islamic regime's persistent repressive measures; And that America's sons and daughters have become the daily targets of its militiamen sent to Iraq as "pilgrims".

There are several ways you can help in making the world hear the cry of freedom of millions of Iranians, who're calling for liberty and their legitimate and violated rights:

1) By demonstrating in order to protest against such meeting in front of the "Washington Club" located at 15 Dupont Circle, N.W. Washington DC 20036, On July 19th from 08:30 till 11:30 AM.

2) By contacting the "Council on Foreign Relations" which is organizing the meeting and protesting against such planning: mbeeuwkes@cfr.org or (212) 434-9716

3) By contacting the US policymakers and officials in order to protest against any support of the Islamic regime and resumption of ties with the Mullahs regime.

They MUST UNDERSTAND the Islamic republic regime is not representative of the Iranian Nation and that it's an Evil regime.

They MUST UNDERSTAND that the only way of establishing a relation between the US and Iran is to back its repressed people and to support them in their quest for SECULARITY and DEMOCRACY....

They MUST UNDERSTAND that supporting the Islamic regime's lobby groups is equal to supporting the "Mother of All Terrorists" and trying to make forget the memories of all those killed in terrorist attacks...

It is YOUR conscientious DUTY to ACT.

Acting TODAY is to help the creation of the Free Iran of Tomorrow and a safer World for all.

July 16, 2004

The "Student Movement Coordination Committee for Democracy in Iran" (SMCCDI)

http://www.daneshjoo.org/generalnews/article/publish/article_7116.shtml

BREAKING NEWS!!!! -- DoctorZin

US sets sights on toppling Iran regime

The Times
July 17, 2004
Michael Binyon and Bronwen Maddox

Re-elected Bush would act to foment revolt, says senior official

THE US will mount a concerted attempt to overturn the regime in Iran if President Bush is elected for a second term.

It would work strenuously to foment a revolt against the ruling theocracy by Iran’s “hugely dissatisfied” population, a senior official has told The Times.

The United States would not use military force, as in Iraq, but “if Bush is re-elected there will be much more intervention in the internal affairs of Iran”, declared the official, who is determined that there should be no let-up in the Administration’s War on Terror.

To what extent the official, known to be hawkish, was speaking for the White House was unclear, but his remarks are nevertheless likely to cause alarm in Europe. He hinted at a possible military strike against Iran’s nuclear facilities, saying that there was a window of opportunity for destroying Iran’s main nuclear complex at Bushehr next year that would close if Russia delivered crucial fuel rods. To destroy Bushehr after the delivery would cause huge environmental damage. The rods would allow the Iranians to obtain enough plutonium for many dozens of nuclear weapons, he said.

The official also stepped up the pressure on Britain, France and Germany to take a tougher line on Iran, voicing the disdain within the Administration for the Europeans’ attempt to defuse the Iranian nuclear threat through diplomacy. Britain had joined the effort in order to demonstrate its European credentials, he said. France and Germany had teamed up with Britain because they realised that the pair of them could no longer run Europe alone.

Washington believes that the trio has been embarrassed by Iran’s failure to hold good to a deal it struck with the Iranian regime last October. Iran pledged to give UN inspectors the freedom to make snap inspections, and also to suspend uranium enrichment.

Since then, some members of the Administration have begun referring in private to Britain, France and Germany as “the Tehran three”, and to Jack Straw, the Foreign Secretary, as “Jack of Tehran”.

If the Europeans fail to get Iran to back down at a meeting this month, the US wants to close the gap between the rival diplomatic approaches and refer Iran to the United Nations Security Council.

Russia is due to deliver the first shipment of nuclear fuel to Iran early next year for insertion into the reactor at Bushehr before the end of the year.

Despite that, the official believes that “it is not impossible to get Russia to see it our way” and back a UN resolution that would “raise the international saliency” of Iran’s nuclear ambitions. He is convinced that Iran is afraid of a “conveyor belt” that would lead inexorably to sanctions and even military action.

Iran is one of the three members of President Bush’s “axis of evil” and has further angered Washington with its covert interference in Iraq since the end of last year’s war to topple Saddam Hussein.

The official dismissed suggestions that Washington would hesitate to seek regime change in Iran, given the problems it has encountered in Iraq, and Colin Powell, a restraining influence as Secretary of State, will not be serving a second term. It is less clear how the Administration could foment a revolution without uniting Iranians against “the Great Satan”.

The official claimed that more than its dislike of the mullahs, the Iranian population was dissatisfied with an economy that did not have jobs for the young: 60 per cent of the population is under 24.

There is little organised opposition inside the country and financing it directly or through front organisations would probably play into the hands of the mullahs anyway.

At present the US relies on about a dozen Farsi satellite television and radio channels in the San Fernando Valley, California. They beam pirate broadcasts to the estimated seven million Iranians with illegal satellite dishes.

Last year Washington also set up a Persian-language Voice of America programme that is broacast into Iraq. The internet offers another channel for US propaganda, but efforts to impose stiff sanctions or fund anti-Government exile groups have been frustrated by a Republican split over the relative merits of confrontation or engagement.

Despite the US threats one of Iran’s top ruling clerics vowed yesterday that the Islamic republic would continue to pursue its controversial nuclear programme. “We are resolute. It is worth achieving it at any cost,” Ayatollah Ahmad Jannati, head of the Guardians Council, said.

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,3-1181969,00.html

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