Iranian Alert -- DAY 31 -- LIVE THREAD PING LIST [Riots erupt]

Live Thread Ping List | 7.10.2003 | DoctorZin

[DoctorZIn]

The next 24-72 hours may be the most important in Iran's history. As Michael Ledeen posted yesterday, "...we can already say that the regime's intimidation was not successful. And you have to admire the courage of these young Iranians..." The events there are encouraging.

We have heard of a demonstration yesterday with about 100,000 Iranians in the Pars region of the city of Tehran. This is a huge demonstration given that the regime was doing everything possible to keep people from gathering in this matter.

We are continuing to hear of the regime’s jamming of the broadcasts in much of Iran. But apparently the signals are getting through much more often.

Iran is a country ready for a regime change. If you follow this thread you will witness, I believe, the transformation of a country. This daily thread provides a central place where those interested in the events in Iran can find the best news and commentary.

Please continue to post your news stories and comments to this thread.

Thanks for all the help.

DoctorZin

[DoctorZIn]

To find all the links to all 31 threads since the protests started, go to:

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[risk]

bump! When do we get streaming video of your wife telling Iranian women about how much freedom our democracy offers women, and how they can be beautiful and feminine and assertive all at the same time?

[zarf]

I prefer Indian women myself. In any case....prayers that the Iranian students can send the raghead murderers packing.

[risk]

prayers that the Iranian students can send the raghead murderers packing.

"...And Keep Your Powder Dry"
Don Freeman #8
Oil, circa, 1943
Gift of Abbott Laboratories
88-159-EI

[GulliverSwift]

Freedom bump. Here's hoping Iran can shake off the shackles of Islamic governance.

[Ernest_at_the_Beach]

Check out this story:

IRAN: U.S. satellite feeds to Iran jammed

Bush Doctrine Unfolds :

To find all articles tagged or indexed using Bush Doctrine Unfold , click below:
	click here >>>	Bush Doctrine Unfold	<<< click here
(To view all FR Bump Lists, click here)

[fly_so_free]

This (regime change) is not going to be easy-Prayers for them-BUMP

[DoctorZIn]

Iran student demonstrators angered by Powell's comments

SPECIAL TO WORLD TRIBUNE.COM
Wednesday, July 9, 2003
In a radio interview reported by BBC, U.S. Secretary of State Colin Powell said last week the United States should stay away from the "family fight" in Iran.

The interview has angered student demonstrators in Iran who compared it with official statements in Teheran in defense of the clerics' regime.

[Associated Press reported that the massive demonstrations planned for July 9 had been canceled because of "the huge security clampdown." Iranian sources said however that some demonstrations are in progress in several Iranian cities and in other major world capitals as well.]

"President Khatami was elected ... not in an American kind of election but an election that essentially tapped into the desires of the people," Powell said in his interview with the the Washington radio station WMAL. "The best thing we can do right now is not get in the middle of this family fight too deeply."

Iran on July 4 welcomed Powell's remarks, saying Washington should stay out of an Iranian "family fight" and hoped the United States had learned its lesson not to interfere in Iran's affairs.

President George W Bush shocked the Iranian regime in June when he endorsed the wave the nationwide demonstrations against the country's religious leadership.

"The recent statements of support by your president in our quest for freedom were of great encouragement to us," wrote Aryo B. Pirouznia representing the demonstrators in a letter to Powell. "His statements were clear and unmistakable."

"In contrast, your words have caused more damage than anything the regime could do or say. We expect the regime to doing everything possible to discourage the people from any protest on this date."

He was referring to July 9, which was the anniversary of the nationwide demonstrations on July 9, 1999 which resulted in a massive crackdown by the government of Ayatollah Khamenei, the successor of Ayatollah Khomeini.

In Washington, the head of an Iranian organization advocating a secular democracy in Iran disputed the notion that Khatami was popularly elected.

"Before his election, Khatami's candidacy was approved by the Iranian Council of Guardians which acts indeed like a religious Politburo," said Assad Homayoun, President of the Azadegan Foundation. "Moreover he, for the last 6 years has merely acted as a public relations man for the "Supreme Leader" Khamenei. That is why these days you hear in the street of Tehran and other cities: 'death to Khamenei' and 'death to Khatami'."

According to Associated Press, student demonstrators cancelled plans for major protests today because of "the huge security clampdown" Iranians in telephone contact with student organizers in Iran said demonstrations were in progress.

For weeks, students had planned to mark the anniversary, seen as a rallying point for those opposed to the ruling clergy and the deployment of police and vigilantes against pro-democracy demonstrators in Iranian cities last month.

Meanwhile, the Washington-based Heritage Foundation said in a report that the Bush administration must increase economic sanctions and press the European Union and Japan to deny Teheran loans. The report, authored, by James Phillips, said such pressure could help the pro-democracy forces in Iran.

"Despite the bloody attempts of pro-government vigilante thugs to quell demonstrations and intimidate the young protesters, the new Iranian revolutionaries have grown in strength and broadened their demands to include democratic reforms and the dismantling of the Islamic regime," the report, entitled "Iran: Revolting Against the Revolution," said. "At this critical time, the United States and its allies should apply firm and relentless pressure on Iran through economic sanctions to support the grassroots movement for reform."

The report rejected the option of dialogue with Iranian President Mohammed Khatami. Khatami and his supporters are not powerful enough to introduce change into the Islamic regime, the report said.

Instead, the report said, the United States must tighten economic sanctions on Iran to "drive home to the regime the costs of repression at home, terrorism abroad, and Iran's continued efforts to build nuclear weapons." Washington must also press its European allies, Japan, and international financial institutions to deny Iran loans, aid, and debt relief.

Such measures must be sustained, the report said, until Iran "halts its support of terrorism, puts its nuclear program under strict international safeguards, and respects the rights of its own people."

The report said the Bush administration has taken a harder line against Iran than the preceding Clinton administration. President Bill Clinton was said to have relaxed economic sanctions on Iran in a failed effort to improve relations with Khatami.

"Firm and relentless pressure is needed to force change in Iran," the report said. "But the Iranian people, who also demand change, could become a key ally in helping to dismantle the Axis of Evil."

http://www.worldtribune.com/worldtribune/breaking_9.html

DoctorZin Note:

Fortunately, the state department "clarified" Powell's statement yesterday.

State Department spokesman Richard Boucher told reporters that the kinds of changes called for by Iranians demonstrating against their government "would be good for Iran and good for Iran's place in the world."

Speaking at the July 7 State Department press briefing in Washington, Boucher called on the Iranian authorities to listen to the demonstrators.

"[T]he Iranian people are calling for much more democracy and for real democracy and open democracy," he said. "So that remains the area where we express our support...."

... All our letters to Powell made a difference.

[Big Bad Bob]

Good Morning from England.

First things first may I apologise for my absence from yesterday's momentous forum. The protests in Tehran and the provinces are a shining example to us all, that even when you live in a hell-hole of a system you can fight for what you believe in. The people on the ground in the capital should be thanked for giving us the true picture of what was going on in Iran over the past month or so.

However, certain broadcasters like the BBC and Channel 4 screened articles, which was so biased towards the Theocracy, that it was beyond belief. I have seen the pictures from the demonstrations in London and around the world. Sadly, you will not be surprised that the above did not report on this, instead ridiculing yourselves, most probably because of both channels undying hatred for America, and as we all know, anything America supports, they and the trendy bastards elsewhere in the media all fall into line. Where is the so-called campaigning Daily Mirror, supposedly supporters of justice and freedom. The silence from Canary Wharf is deafening.

KEEP UP THE FIGHT, DON'T LET THE BASTARDS GET YOU DOWN.

FORZA IRAN
FORZA FREEDOM

[DoctorZIn]

The drudgereport.com just posted the article on the jamming of the LA based Iranian broadcasters uplink transmissions. It is an interesting article.

[risk]

>>>> State Department spokesman Richard Boucher told reporters that the kinds of changes called for by Iranians demonstrating against their government "would be good for Iran and good for Iran's place in the world."

I hate to rain on the parade, but folks we are being appeased by the masters of grovel and pounce. The State Department has not been reformed, our real tools of diplomacy (namely our idle military capacity) are still being squandered, and the Neros at State fiddle around with pacification (including of we rabble rousers) and Iranians are languishing in dark prisons, receiving life-altering beatings, and taking random bullets fired by Arabs who are thirsty for infidel blood.

[risk]

Oh yeah, and Straw is a vicar of a devil-worshipping animal sacrifice cult! /sarcasm

[DoctorZIn]

...certain broadcasters like the BBC and Channel 4 screened articles, which was so biased towards the Theocracy, that it was beyond belief....

It is good to from a straight thinking Brit.

[DoctorZIn]

Vigilantes attack Iranian protestors

By Robin Gedye, Foreign Affairs Writer
(Filed: 10/07/2003)

Hundreds of Iranian Islamic vigilantes, police and pro-democracy youths fought running battles near Teheran university last night on the anniversary of 1999 student unrest.

Despite the risk of violence from the authorities and religious zealots, thousands of Iranian protesters took to the streets.

Police were reported to have fired teargas and engaged in fist fights with plainclothes Islamic militiamen to prevent them from attacking the demonstrators in further running battles with the youths.

Large numbers of protesters' vehicles were seen driving around Enghelab (Revolution) Square. Earlier in the day armed Islamic vigilantes broke through a police cordon to kidnap three student leaders after authorities banned the pro-reform gatherings.

About 15 so-called vigilantes - hardline supporters of the supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei - arrived outside the offices of Iran's main student organisation just as a news conference by the students was ending.

Armed with handguns, carrying walkie-talkies and wearing their trademark beards and shirts outside their trousers, they barged their way past police and wrestled the three students to the ground before bundling them into the cars.

Several other students, who had assembled to announce the cancellation of demonstrations following a government ban and threats, barricaded themselves in their headquarters at the Office to Consolidate Unity, refusing to leave until the police guaranteed them protection. They later drove off in minibuses to catch taxis home.

Reza Ameri-Nassab, one of those kidnapped, said before his disappearance that the OCU had decided to postpone demonstrations on the advice of supportive MPs who considered the dangers of detentions and reprisals too great.

"Since we believe that President Mohammad Khatami's reforms have come to an end, we wanted to stage a sit-in opposite the United Nations," he said.

"But we have not forgotten our demands for the immediate release of our eight fellow students from OCU [arrested during student demonstrations last month]."

He said a commemoration of the July 9, 1999, student-police clashes in Teheran, when one student was shot dead and hundreds were arrested and injured, would be held at the beginning of the next academic year in September.

Authorities have closed the university, banned off-campus rallies, closed campus dormitories, postponed summer examinations and vowed to deal strictly with any unrest after arresting 4,000 people during 10 nights of sometimes violent protest across Iran last month.

Half of the people arrested at last month's demonstrations have been released, but students fear the remainder have been kept locked-up as a warning to anyone contemplating further protests.

• Mohamed ElBaradei, the director of the International Atomic Energy Agency, said yesterday he had agreed with Iranian officials to send experts to Teheran next week to clarify Iranian concerns over tighter nuclear inspections.

Iran has so far resisted calls from the IAEA to sign a protocol to the nuclear non-proliferation treaty to allow the agency to conduct more rigorous, short-notice inspections of atomic sites.

http://www.portal.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2003/07/10/wiran10.xml&sSheet=/portal/2003/07/10/ixportal.html&secureRefresh=true&_requestid=178232

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

[DoctorZIn]

...The State Department has not been reformed, our real tools of diplomacy (namely our idle military capacity) are still being squandered, and the Neros at State fiddle around with pacification...

I was not claiming the state department has suddenly been reformed. But we were successful in getting them to reassert their support for the Iranian people's effort to create a true secular democracy.

[risk]

I agree, we got their attention. Progress is progress, anything encouraging is better than what we heard from Powell.

[DoctorZIn]

Tehran in turmoil as students protest

By Michael Theodoulou
July 10, 2003

THOUSANDS of prodemocracy demonstrators converged last night on Tehran University and fought street battles with police and Islamic vigilantes on the fourth anniversary of campus protests that were brutally suppressed.

Police clashed with hardline Islamic vigilantes, who tried to approach the area where the demonstrators had formed a long traffic jam in their cars. They also fired teargas at the protesters.

“The atmosphere is very tense, the smell of teargas is thick in the air. Police have clashed with youths, the youths have fought with basijis and I saw police fighting basijis trying to get closer to the university,” a witness said.

The basij militiamen, identifiable only by their beards, clubs and untucked shirts, are fiercely loyal to Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, the Supreme Leader, Iran’s most powerful figure. They are outside the control of the reformist President Khatami, who indirectly supervises the civilian police through the Interior Ministry and the National Security Council, which he heads.

Hundreds of riot police reinforcements later poured in to take control of the area, dispersing crowds and chasing youths into side streets and beating them with batons.

Police appeared to have a firmer grip on security than during last month’s unrest, when at times they stood by and watched as vigilantes beat protesters with chains, cables and clubs and roared around on motorcycles attacking protesters at will. But cars still clogged the downtown area into the night, with drivers beeping horns in support of the protesters when basij or police were not looking.

The authorities had taken measures to silence radio and satellite television stations run by exiles in California. Authorities had also banned gatherings and closed campuses in the expectation of possible unrest to mark the anniversary, which came shortly after a wave of student demonstrations.

Last month 4,000 people, including some 30 student leaders, were arrested during ten nights of sometimes violent protests across Iran that received warm support from Washington. At least 2,000 people are still being held.

Those detentions, together with a lack of organisation and direction among protesters and disunity among student groups, mean that the regime is not under the sort of immediate threat that hawks in the Bush Administration might hope, analysts say.

But the June protests were a warning that the old guard will ignore at its peril because the students were joined by many ordinary people who voiced some of the most daring anti-regime slogans ever heard. Frustrations have been steadily mounting among the young population at the old guard’s determination to block attempts by elected reformist politicians to liberalise the Islamic system.

The clashes last night came after Iran attempted to relieve external pressure by agreeing to work with the United Nations nuclear watchdog on the prospect of allowing more intrusive inspections of its nuclear programme.

Mohammed ElBaradei, the Director-General of the International Atomic Energy Agency, said that he would send a team of experts to Iran next week to clarify the country’s concerns over signing an additional protocol to the Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) that would allow surprise visits to its facilities.

“I hope that, once these issues have been clarified, Iran will be in a position to sign the protocol. But naturally that is a decision for the Iranian Government to make,” he said.

He described his talks in Tehran with President Khatami and other senior officials as “open, direct and constructive”.

Gholam-Reza Aghazedeh, the head of Iran’s atomic energy agency, said that he was “certain that co-operation with the IAEA will bring very good results”.

Iran denies American accusations that it is using the nuclear energy programme as a cover for developing nuclear weapons, but has said that it would only consider signing the additional protocol if other NPT signatories met their obligations relating to the transfer of civil nuclear technology.

There were indications that Iran might agree to sign an additional protocol, diplomats said. “An increasing number of government spokesmen and majlis (parliament) deputies are talking about Iran’s readiness to sign an additional protocol, although there’s nothing concrete yet,” an Asian diplomat said.

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,3-740779,00.html

[DoctorZIn]

Tension Mounts Over Student Protests in Iran

July 10, 2003
The Jerusalem Post
Matthew Gutman

Shrugging off death threats by government paramilitary forces, thousands of Iranian students took to the streets Wednesday night, according to Israel Radio.

They called for the country's democratization and death to its extremist leader, Ayatollah Ali Khameini.

The demonstrations, banned by the regime, came on the fourth anniversary of 1999 pro-reform protests which triggered a violent regime crackdown, the death of one student, and the arrest of thousands.

However, AP reported from Teheran that faced by swarms of police and right-wing vigilantes, the students canceled their plans to hold a protest.
Opposition group leaders hailed the demonstrations - the culmination of month-long anti-government activities - as a deadly blow to the repressive regime, saying it edges Iran ever closer to a democratic revolution.

"This is a very big step forward in the road to the democratization in Iran," Safa Haeri, editor of the the Iranian Press Service told The Jerusalem Post from Paris.

Beyond the demonstrations themselves, Haeri regarded the student's success in capturing world media attention "a watershed event."

He said the demonstrations and a student letter campaign calling Iran a "political apartheid state" might compel the US to slap an embargo on Iran for violating basic human rights.

Following an eerily quiet day, three-sided street battles erupted between pro-reform youth, regime-backed paramilitary forces, and police outside Teheran University.

Thousands also gathered around one of Teheran's main squares Wednesday night chanting pro-democracy slogans and calling for the death of Khameini, an opposition source said.

The protests also coincide with mounting international pressure on Iran to reveal its secret nuclear reactors.

On a visit to Iran Wednesday, International Atomic Energy Agency chief Muhammad el-Baradei failed to secure agreement to immediately allow more rigorous inspections of Teheran's suspected nuclear program.

The Iranian regime consents only to prearranged visits to sites it chooses to declare.

But facing mounting pressure from the US and Britain, Iran has said it would only consider signing the protocol if other Non-Proliferation Treaty signatories met their obligations relating to the transfer of civil nuclear technology.

Earlier in the day, three student leaders were arrested after they criticized the government in a news conference.

Government-supported militants have been attacking students, invading student dormitories, and beating students in their sleep for more than a month. The attacks are aimed at discouraging students from their almost nightly demonstrations calling for an end to the repressive regime.

With crackdowns coming with increasing fury, students have fought back, for the first time calling for Khameini's death, a crime punishable with a hefty prison term or even disappearance at the hands of the paramilitary forces.

In an effort to forestall the demonstrations, the government deployed the paramilitary Ansar Hizbullah and the Basij volunteers - notorious for their pro-ayatollah fanaticism and their penchant for spilling blood.

The mullahs told reformist parliament deputies to rein in demonstrators or they "would be mercilessly crushed," according to a Iranian opposition source.

The paramilitary groups were not armed with batons but with firearms, said the source.

In an open letter to UN General-Secretary Kofi Annan, student leaders claimed that "a political apartheid has taken all hopes from the Iranian people, because it is denying us self-rule and the right of choice, the right to be master of our own destiny, because it has lowered our expectations to the lowest limits possible and also because we are worried to see the experience of our neighbors be repeated here."

The signatories represented student associations of 30 universities.

Part of the impetus for the continued pressure on the government originates with US, France, and UK-based opposition groups openly supporting student revolt.

Pentagon sources have for months been prophesying a student revolt that could, if only eventually, topple the regime.

One Israel-based Farsi broadcaster, Menashe Amir, predicted that an Iranian national uprising is a matter of time. He cited Iranians' anger at poverty, drug addiction, and support for international terror.

The Jerusalem-based station broadcasts Iranian-language talk shows on short-wave frequencies that can be heard in Iran. Iranians.

Israel Radio estimates tens of millions of Iranians listen to its Farsi broadcasts, particularly during times of unrest, and says people from all walks of society call in regularly.

http://www.jpost.com/servlet/Satellite?pagename=JPost/A/JPArticle/ShowFull&cid=1057813447061

[DoctorZIn]

Here is an excellent article on our friend Banafsheh as it appeared, as I understand, in the Washington Post....

Profile: One woman's work for Iran

By Eli J. Lake
UPI State Department Correspondent

WASHINGTON, July 8 (UPI) -- On the first Thanksgiving after Sept. 11, 2001, Siamak Pourzand was abducted for the fourth time in 22 years by Iran's internal security services on charges that he was having an affair with the receptionist of the cultural center he was running.

While he was in prison, the septuagenarian film critic and journalist was kept in a roughly 6-by-6-foot cell with no windows. His captors played recordings of imams reading from the Koran at all hours, he was shocked repeatedly with electrical prods, and his guards would occasionally urinate in his mouth, according to his daughter. A year later he was released, but only after appearing several pounds lighter on a national television show called "Second Identity," where he was forced to admit to he had ties with exiled monarchists.

"It is really tough to see a parent in that state," Banafsheh Zand-Bonazzi said, her voice trembling, fighting back tears. Zand-Bonazzi lives in New York and has not been in Iran for over 20 years. But the experience of fighting for her father's release from prison has reconnected her with her native land. "I realized that in order to fight for my father, I had to fight for my country."

Now she and a handful of other Iranian are working overtime to provide support for the burgeoning democracy movement there. Since the beginning of last month, Zand-Bonazzi has spent her evenings on the phone with contacts in Iran checking on the progress of the intermittent demonstrations in the country in the lead up to a general strike planned for Wednesday on the fourth anniversary of student protests. "You should see my phone bill," she says.

A curator by trade, Zand-Bonazzi is part of a network of Iranian Americans trying to raise funds for individuals that have taken their case to the Iranian diaspora. This network lobbies governments to withdraw support for the clerical regime in Tehran and Qom, often through the media.

"This is to support their demonstrations and their movement," Zand-Bonazzi said.

Zand-Bonazzi's work could prove a critical link between Washington and Tehran as the National Security Council continues to debate the prudence of the United States providing more direct support to the indigenous democrats fighting the mullahs. Since November, an ambitious policy directive on Iran has been deadlocked in debate as the State Department and members of the NSC staff have attempted to broach a dialogue with the Iranian regime.

The stakes are high. The same day that the activists in the country are planning a general strike, the International Atomic Energy Agency's Director General Mohammed ElBaradei is expected to arrive in Tehran to oversee another round of inspections of the country's nuclear-energy facilities. Last month, his agency issued a report that found numerous questions unanswered regarding whether certain facilities were cover for a weapons program.

Meanwhile, the demonstrators appear to be getting more restless. Zand-Bonazzi and others have developed a network of between 300 and 400 individuals on the ground in Iran who can distribute funds raised in the West.

"Over the last few years, a couple of hundred thousand dollars has been raised and sent to different leaders," she said. When asked for their names she said, "We'd rather have leaders who are alive and unknown, then famous and dead."

The choice for getting money to activists on the ground is often through simple wire transfers. Unlike Iraq, where the state kept close tabs on money wired from the West, it is fairly easy to get amounts under a $1,000 to individuals without the government knowing about it in Iran. "We wire it to somebody who then distributes it. We have a few people who do this," she said.

But sometimes this process is corrupted. She says there have been instances of individuals who were out for personal gain pocketing cash that was meant for students. Zand-Bonazzi also talks ominously about agents of the Islamic Republic working in other Iranian-American organizations. "We have identified people working for the mullahs. We know who they are."

But her work has not ended there. She has distributed pictures from Iran of recent demonstrations and a room at one university that has started a hunger strike. In addition, Zand-Bonazzi has worked closely with Sen. Brownback, R-Kan., and his staff for the passage of the Iran Democracy Act, a bill that would create a $50 million fund largely for broadcasts from California into Iran through satellite television and radio stations.

Within the Iranian-American community, the topic of direct U.S. funding for internal dissident groups is controversial. Assad Homayoun, a former diplomat under the shah who runs the Azadegan Foundation said in an interview, "We should get moral support and political support of the United States, but not money. Any national leader should depend on Iranian money."

Banafsheh Zand-Bonazzi is trying her best to see to it that Iran's next leaders will get plenty of it today.