BREAKING IN PROGRESS - Ayatollah Boroujerdi Revolts

LATEST UPDATE - all phones in the area of the Ayatollah's house have been disconnected and his numbers, which worked till just now have a recording saying "they never existed".

Monitored from live communication with Iran and the Ayatollah Boroujerdi himself by Voice of Iran Radio (KRSI) and local citizens calling in from Tehran to KRSI.

Shots were being fired around the Ayatollah's home at Sard (cold) Park, Avesta Avenue, Sard Street #9 close to Freedom Square. Fires are springing up in the region at major intersections. Ambulance sirens scream futiley as Tehran citizens pour toward that address blocking streets to prevent Security forces from getting close but also blocking the paramedics and ambulances.

Distress calls from wounded men and women fill the air waves as what they describe as total war is erupting. KRSI, which covers all of Iran, constantly broadcasts calls for the populace to rise up, urging them to make the most of this opportunity.

Said Ghayem-Maghami, the announcer of KRSI repeatedly urges all provinces, cities, professions to revolt against the current regime. He also broadcasts live all suggestions provided by Tehran citizens to wake everyone up and let them know something is up.

Ayatollah Boroujerdi, blockaded on the roof of his home, has used the phone contact broadcast with KRSI to declare that anyone in the Security forces who respects him as their spiritual source should lay down their arms and not harm anyone.

Other Ayatollahs like Mehdi Haeri have come on live to urge the people not to set gas stations on fire or do other damage as these sugestions phoned into KRSI come from the Security forces agents.

Ayatollah Haeri added that fasting during this crisis in the month of Ramadan is not required, giving the example of the urgency of a house catching on fire compared to a lower urgency of fasting. He insisted that religion and politics has to be separate and that the populace should support the brve efforts of Ayatollah Boroujerdi.

Meanwhile Mohssein Ejai, Minister of Information and Security (MOIS), has promised Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei that he will bring him Ayatollah Boroujerdi's severed head before dawn.

In the first serious clash with the old guard Mullahs, the Hojatieh fringe sect of the Ahmadi-Nejad administration sent security forces around 10 a.m. (Tehran time) Saturday, to arrest Ayatollah Seyed Hossein Kazeymeni Boroujerdi, son of the Ayatollah of the same name, killed by the Khomeini Islamic regime.

His father was so respected by the late Shah of Iran that when questions about religion arose for which the Shah wanted advice, the monarch would drive down to the holy city of Qom to speak to the Ayatollah instead of ordering him to Tehran.

The younger Ayatollah Boroujerdi recently declared that the national Administrative Government of Iran should be separated from the Clerics and become purely secular. Religion and Politics must be separated he said, live on KRSI.

The current Islamic regime's reaction was to issue death warrant for him falsely claiming apostasy by him because he was said by them to have claimed to be the 12th Imam, who disappeared down a well 1300 years ago and will return to redeem the world.

His followers resisted the efforts of the Security Agents sent during the afternoon to capture the Ayatollah and the on-going confrontation has resulted with multiple arrests, estimated by the Ayatollah himself in a live phone interview as being several thousand people. His people, who rushed to protect him also took several security agents hostage, finding bottles of acid in their pockets, intended to disfigure demonstrators.

The mostly foreign, generally Arab national, Bassiji paramilitary forces, whose total role is to suppress any street demonstration and have been recently equipped with over $500 million of equipment and weaponry and appear in both civilian clothes and uniforms, attacked on motorcycles but were repulsed and several of their motorcycles set on fire.

They brought in eight tanker trucks that propel boiling water onto demonstrators but streets were soon blocked and their efforts curtailed. Currently, regime forces have surrounded the area and blocked major access. Clashes at crossroads initially drove security forces back but reinforcements managed to set up a cordon and hold it.

One panicked caller to KRSI at around 2:15 a.m. (TT) screamed that he had been spotted by the regime mercenaries and had been given refuge inside a nearby house but that the agents were kicking in the door. He pleaded with KRSI to give out his name and remind people that he was about to be arrested and might never be seen again.

Several of those wounded and finding refuge in Ayatollah Boroujerdi's house were women. One an Armenian woman, not a Moslem, called on minorities and specially Armenians, to rush to the Ayatollah's support and to come into the streets. Another woman, a baby in her arms, a club in her hand was seen standing guard at Ayatollah Boroujerdi's ready to face anything the regime would throw at her. Including confiscating the bread and food that those at the residence required to break their Ramadan fast.

Calls by Tehranis demanded Ahmad Hossein Khomeini, the Islamic regime founder's grandson and Ayatollah Montazeri, should join in the resistance and defend Ayatollah Boroujerdi. Other calls wanted the late Shah's son Reza Pahlavi to join the fray and call on the West to provide tangible support to his countrymen in their time of need at this moment of opportunity.

Another caller mentioned that every single one of about 300,000 Bahais in Iran had been recently identified and listed, including their addresses, and wondered if this was an indicator that a slaughter of these thorns in the side of the Hojatieh as about to happen. Bahais claim to follow their spiritual leader is the 12th Imam, who has already returned.

Meanwhile, in a dramatic gesture of defiance, Ayatollah Boroujerdi carrying his burial shroud and a sword paces the roof of his home.

Observers and analysts hope that if the resistance can survive through the night, in the morning, people who sleep unaware of what is going on will join the uprising. Some of those woken up at random by phone calls showed very little interest, responding that replacing one Mullah with another gets them nowhere, so why risk their lives.

Payvand's Iran News ...

10/7/06
Iran: Outspoken Ayatollah Alleges Official Persecution
By Golnaz Esfandiari

PRAGUE, October 6, 2006 (RFE/RL) -- A dissident Iranian cleric who advocates the separation of religion and politics, Ayatollah Seyyed Hossein Kazemeyni Boroujerdi, is accusing officials of persecuting him and his followers. Boroujerdi claims dozens of his supporters have been arrested and taken to Tehran's notorious Evin prison in recent weeks. The ayatollah tells RFE/RL that he has appealed for help from international figures that include the Roman Catholic pope and EU foreign policy chief Javier Solana.

Ayatollah Boroujerdi says that in the past 14 years, he has been summoned on numerous occasions to the country's Special Court for Clergy and spent months in prison. He claims he still suffers from health problems stemming from torture he was subjected to in prison.

"I was in prison in 1995 for several months. Then, in 2001, I was also arrested several times -- they confiscated two of my mosques," Boroujerdi says. "It's ridiculous -- an establishment that says it is Islamic confiscates an active and open mosque. In 1979, the marjah (eds: source of emulation) at that time, Mr. Golpayegani, put me in charge of the Hematabad mosque. Only a few people used to go to that mosque -- but in 2001, when they took it away from me, many people were coming there. We always faced a lack of space for prayers."

Nipping A Threat?

The Shi'ite cleric says pressure has increased significantly since the summer, following a gathering he held for his supporters. He claims that thousands of people attended his June 30 religious meeting in Tehran's Shahid Keshvari stadium.

"About two months and a half ago, there was something similar to a coup d'etat against me -- because our last meeting was such that it shook the city and it made the establishment think that if they don't stop me, then there will be millions of people [supporting me]," Boroujerdi says. "So they began harassing me; they surrounded my house for two months."

Ayatollah Boroujerdi claims that many of his supporters have also been targeted. He says in recent weeks, more than 100 people have been arrested and tortured in jail. He says some have been fired from their jobs, and others have been under pressure to campaign against him.

Iranian officials have been silent on the topic.

But earlier this week, Amnesty International reported that at least 41 of Boroujerdi's followers were arrested in his courtyard. The rights group has warned that the cleric could be at risk of imminent arrest.

State And Religion

The ayatollah says his belief in the separation of religion from politics and his refusal to support "political religion" have drawn the ire of Iran's leaders. Iran's Islamic establishment is based on the principle of "velayat-e faqih," or the rule of the Islamic jurist.

Reports have emerged in recent years of other clerics and dissidents who have criticized the velayat-e faqih principle being persecuted in Iran.

They include the late Grand Ayatollah Kazem Shariatmadari, an influential Iranian cleric who was placed under house arrest in the 1980s.

Shariatmadari's son, Hassan, lives in Germany. He told RFE/RL that some 27 years after the establishment of an Islamic republic in Iran, many of the country's clerics have realized that the involvement of religion in politics subjugates religion to the will of the state.

"The political establishment forces them to accept its demands and interpret the religion in accordance with the establishment's needs," Hassan Shariatmadari says. "Most clerics have realized this, but because of the heavy price of opposition to the regime, most of them do not have the courage to express [that view] publicly. Ayatollah Boroujerdi has been able to express the demand for the separation of religion from politics very openly -- to a wide audience and with boldness. This is something that this establishment doesn't like."

Shariatmadari says he thinks Iran's leadership feels threatened by Ayatollah Boroujerdi because they are concerned that other clerics could follow his example.

Not Remaining Quiet

Boroujerdi tells RFE/RL that the authorities have threatened him with execution, and told him that the clergy should speak in a united voice.

Boroujerdi has written letters to Pope Benedict XVI and to EU foreign-policy chief Solana noting what he calls the "suspicious death" in 2002 of his father, Ayatollah Seyyed Mohammad Ali Kazemeyni Boroujerdi, who was also a prominent cleric. He claims Iranian authorities expropriated the mosque where his father had preached and destroyed his father's grave.

But Boroujerdi remains defiant.

"I demonstrate that real Islam is free of political ornaments," Boroujerdi says. "It is included in verses whose interpretation is different than that provided by [the authorities]. Its interpretation is from 1,428 years ago. It is about the rule of the Prophet [Muhammad] and how he lived; he was against repression and opposed discrimination. Our divine leaders took food from their mouths and the mouths of their children to give it to the poor. Today, unfortunately, despite the immense wealth of this country, people live in poverty."

'People Have Turned Away From God'

Boroujerdi says many Iranians have lost faith in religion because of the worsening economic situation, including high inflation and unemployment.

He argues that under the shah's regime, people's faith in Islam was much stronger. He thinks belief in God has actually fallen victim to Iran's theocracy.

"When people lose their income, they directly blame the establishment and they become angry at God," Boroujerdi says. "I've said many times that we should help people worship their God again and make peace with God. Today we are in the month of Ramadan, [but] many people have turned away from God because of repression, discrimination, and pressure."

One of the ayatollah's devotees, Hamid, tells RFE/RL that Boroujerdi's views and defiance have won him support from Iranians of different classes.

"Ayatollah Boroujerdi has never polluted religion with politics," Hamid says. "He has not become involved in politics, and he has always supported the needy. He has always said, 'I'm a supporter of the wretched.' This is, I think, one of the reasons for his popularity."

Hamid says he is ready to support the ayatollah even "until martyrdom."

Clashes in Iran to defend critical cleric - reports
Sun Oct 8, 2006 1:00 PM BST

http://today.reuters.co.uk/news/articlenews.aspx?storyid=2006-10-08T115958Z_01_BLA829259_RTRUKOC_0_UK-IRAN-CLERIC.xml&type=worldNews&WTmodLoc=World-C3-More-7

TEHRAN (Reuters) - Supporters of a senior Shi'ite Muslim cleric who has challenged Iran's system of clerical rule have clashed with police during a protest outside the cleric's house, Iranian media reported on Sunday.

Police used teargas to disperse the crowd, which was estimated at 200 people or more, who had gathered on Saturday outside the home in southern Tehran of Ayatollah Mohammad Kazemeini Boroujerdi, newspapers reported.

Etemad-e Melli daily said protesters formed a cordon around the house to call for the release of Boroujerdi's followers who they said had been detained. Some newspapers said the crowd feared Boroujerdi might himself be arrested.

Seday-e Edalat reported that the crowd, some carrying knives, lit fires to stop police approaching the house. A picture showed police in riot geared lined up near a crowd of people in the street and smoke rising up.

Officials were not immediately available to comment.

The Iranian authorities are wary of any challenge, particularly from top clerics, to the system of clerical rule that was established after the 1979 Islamic revolution by revolutionary leader Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini.

"We believe that our nation is tired of political religion and they want to return to traditional religion," Boroujerdi told Iran's labour news agency ILNA on Saturday.

He said he had written to U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan, European Union foreign policy chief Javier Solana, Pope Benedict and other leaders asking them "to make efforts to spread traditional religion", ILNA reported.

A senior police officer was quoted as saying Boroujerdi claimed to be a representative of the "hidden" 12th Imam, who Shi'ite Muslims revere, and this prompted some people to make donations.

"This is misinterpreting religion and is sheer lies," the police officer was quoted by Seday-e Edalat as saying.

Iran has an elected president and parliament, but final authority lies with the supreme leader, currently Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, according to 'velayat-e faqih', the system of rule by a religious legal scholar that was propounded by Khomeini.

The supreme leader is chosen by an assembly of elected clerics.

Some traditional Shi'ite Muslim clerics hold that religious leaders should not have a political role.

The protesters outside Boroujerdi's home chanted "God is greatest" and verses from the Muslim holy book, the Koran. One newspaper said a placard they carried read: "We are ready to be martyred for defending traditional religion."

As an ayatollah, Boroujerdi holds one of the highest ranks in the Shi'ite Muslim religious hierarchy.

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