Free Republic

A key Iranian dissident tells Newsmax he was stunned when he heard President Barack Obama tell reporters that, despite government's brutal crackdown in Tehran, the Islamic Republic has time to regain “legitimacy” in the eyes of the Iranian people. “I was hoping President Obama would lead the world and start a boycott of Iranian oil,” said former presidential candidate and opposition activist Mohsen Sazegara. “This is the best way to save the lives of the Iranian people.” Instead, Sazegara told Newsmax, he listened to Obama’s news conference on Tuesday with a sense of disbelief. It's "not too late for the...

TEHRAN, Iran (AP) - A revolutionary court Sunday sentenced a prominent liberal political dissident to five years in prison on charges of trying to topple the Islamic system, his lawyer said. Mohammad Mohsen Sazgara was also sentenced in absentia to five years deprivation of his social rights, meaning he cannot take official posts or compete in elections. Sazgara, who lives in the United States, co-organized an Internet-based referendum for Iranian people to vote for their favourite political system in a challenge to the Islamic republic earlier this year. "My client believes his charges are baseless and the revolutionary court is...

WASHINGTON - A key opponent of the government of Iran will be arriving here this month to urge American support for the idea of holding a popular referendum in Iran on whether the country should remain a theocracy. The visit from Mohsen Sazegara comes as demonstrations in Iran have cropped up during the country's festival of fire before the Persian new year, featuring some revelers shouting slogans in favor of President Bush. Mr. Sazegara, who shares this vision for Iran, argues that the best to way realize it is by calling on the regime to allow a free vote to...

After years of bitter internal divisions and a series of crackdowns from the Islamic Republic, the Iranian democratic opposition in the last two weeks has organized a united front to push for a referendum on the powers of the supreme leader. In an exclusive interview with “The New York Sun”, a founder of the new front, which comprises the major student groups as well as leading lawyers and activists inside the country, said organizers this week began fanning out across Persia to collect the names of fellow citizens for a petition supporting changes to the constitution to allow a referendum....