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Banafsheh Zand-Bonazzi
Editor-in-Chief

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Source: Azarmehr Blog

October 21, 2010

Combing through Iran news today, I came across an article in one of the pro-Ahmadinejad websites. The title was ‘Israeli Women Sell Their Bodies: [Pictures Included]‘ and the first paragraph said:
‘In a blatant act of decadence and social moral corruption, women are displayed for sale in shop windows throughout Israel’s major chain stores’. The article quotes several Israeli papers to back up its claim for this depraved social perversion which is gripping Israel and ends with a paragraph which says:
‘Each woman has a price tag, which also displays her age, weight, size and her country of birth. The pictures below show modern women slavery in Israel, a country which claims to have democracy!’

So the message to the people of Iran is clear, democracy will lead to women being displayed in shop windows as sex commodities, is this what you want?

As I scrolled down to see the images and decide whether democracy should be pursued or not, I noticed the women didn’t look like they were trying to attract customers. The images didn’t look they were trying to entice or provoke men in a sexual way, unless Ahmadinejad supporters find a picture of a battered woman with a black eye sexually enticing! In fact it looked more like a powerful protest against human trafficking and prostitution. The caption for the picture below published in the Iranians news website says ‘Slave market in Israel’.

And sure enough, the truth is nothing like what the pro-Ahmadinejad sites are claiming with their exact same texts. When did Ahmadinejad and his followers ever tell the truth? It was in fact a protest to highlight the problem of human trafficking for the sex industry and the protesters were calling for people who pay for sex to be prosecuted too.

See the version slightly nearer to the truth: http://www.euronews.net/2010/10/20/women-to-go-protest-targets-sex-trade-in-israel/

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* * State-run daily, Iran, reports that in recent days, four of the ‘Mournful Mothers’, all women who have lost children in the anti-regime protests in Iran since the June 2009 fraudulent election, were arrested.

Agents arrested the four women at Tehran’s airport, while they were waiting to board flights to Germany. The Iranian regime has accused the four, all members of the reformist Mournful Mothers of espionage and collaboration with France-based Iranian opposition group, Mujahedeen Khalq (also known as MEK, MKO, PMOI or National Council of Resistance).  They are all being detained in an undisclosed location.

The Iranian judiciary and prosecutor’s office also claim to have built a case against reformist leader Mir Hossein Mousavi’s wife Dr. Zahra Rahnavard (photo right), who is a prominent member of the Mournful Mothers. Reports however indicate that typically, the four women have been abused, pressured and even tortured while in detention, to force them to make false confessions against Rahnavard alleging she has conspired with the PMOI.

* * The office of the Iranian reformist party, Mojahedeen of the Islamic Revolution, was raided by the Iranian regime’s plain clothes militia members. Reformist website, Jaras reports that the agents confiscated all computers, and documents from the office and that during the raid two of the employees were locked away in a room.

In September the Iranian public prosecutor prosecutor and spokesman for the judiciary announced that the two reformist parties Mohajedeen of the Islamic Revolution and Islamic Iran Participation front have been officially dissolved by the judiciary.  The two organizations disputed the decision and the IIPF even published a document revealing that one of the branches of the Revolutionary court has in fact annulled the move against their organization and reinstated them.

Last week, Mohammad Salamti, secretary general of Mojahedeen of the Islamic Revolution announced that his organization still considers itself a legal entity and will continue all its activities within the framework of the law.

He announced that the organization has not been involved in any legal action against it and none of its representatives have been summoned to any legal proceedings.

Mojahedin of the Islamic Revolution started its political activities in its current form in 1991. Following the 2009 presidential elections and the widespread protests over the alleged vote fraud that returned Mahmoud Ahmadinejad to power, several executive members of this organization were arrested.

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Ahmadinejad to journalist: “Who says we don’t have absolute freedom?” cartoon by Nikahang Kosar

* * Below: A video of the city of Qom where all the shops have been shut down by security forces ahead of Khamenei’s arrival today in that city.

* * Iran launches Extensive Research into Uranium Mine Exploration. Ali-Akbar Salehi, Director of the Iranian Atomic Energy Agency,  announced that the launch of extensive uranium discovery projects in the central and southern regions of Iran. Salehi specified  that the discovery of uranium is a top priority in the activities of the Atomic Agency and that Iran is determined to meet its uranium needs domestically. He also added that Yazd and Bandar Abbas regions are already under extensive discovery projects.

Though the West maintains that Iran’s uranium reserves are not extensive, Iranian nuclear officials have repeatedly claimed that Iran does in fact have adequate uranium reserves.

* * According to Iranian minority Sunni website SunniOnline, Iranian regime authorities have prohibited Sunni mosques to hold Friday prayers. Leaders of the al-Dawa wa al-Islah group represents Egypt’s Islamist Muslim Brotherhood movement in Iran were quoted as saying: “The government has told Sunni members of parliament that no such repression is occurring, but we saw Iranian officials preventing the Sunni faithful from praying last Friday in Tehran. Authorities are violating article 12 of the Iranian Constitution, which guarantees freedom of worship for Sunnis in Iran”.

Sunni Muslims in Iran comprise eight percent of the population and most live on the borders of Iran. A majority of Kurds, Baluchis and Turkmans, and Arabs are Sunnis, as are small communities in southern Iran and the Khorasan region in the northeast

* * Iran’s Azad (Open) University announced that all “secular” members of their faculty are to be discharged. These professors are supporters of the separation of religion and state.

Member of Iranian Parliament (Majles) representing the university, Karim Zareh,  told the Iranian state-run news agency, Mehr news: “These members were given a number of warnings which were not heeded; therefore, they were dismissed.  However the number of dismissals were minimal. If they were not permanent members of the faculty or on probationary period, the dismissal was straightforward. However, a few had tenure so the faculty has to make a decision about them.”

Hassan Ahadi, deputy education officer of the Azad University confirmed Zareh’s statement and added: “The ‘secular’ professors of their institution are an absolute minority which rather than being fired should be brought back into the fold. We must try to attract and absorb these few members. If we claim to be better Muslims, we should spend more time and energy on them.”

In the past year, a number of Open University professors have been dismissed for not being in line with the Islamic Republic doctrines.  The Open University, with 375 branches in Iran and abroad, is Iran’s private sector in secondary education. Dismissal of professors in public universities is also underway since Ayatollah Khamenei identified the universities, especially the humanities, as one of the roots of the political unrest that rocked the country in summer of 2009 following allegations of fraud in the re-election of Mahmoud Ahmadinejad.  In recent months, Kamran Daneshjou, Iranian Minister of Science has repeatedly called for the destruction of universities that do not adhere to the to the Islamic Worldview and the principles of Velayat’eh Faqih.

]]> http://planet-iran.com/index.php/news/25801/feed 1 http://planet-iran.com/index.php/news/25728 http://planet-iran.com/index.php/news/25728#comments Mon, 18 Oct 2010 15:46:23 +0000 Zand-Bon http://planet-iran.com/?p=25728

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Khatam-ol Anbiya’ Corporation to take part in newly-launched project to construct Iran’s largest highway

Source: The Meir Amit Intelligence and Terrorism Information Center

October 18, 2010

A project called “Shrine to Shrine” was launched earlier this week in an inauguration ceremony attended by President Ahmadinejad. The project involves the construction of a six-lane highway with a total length of over 600 mi connecting Qom, Tehran, and Mashhad. The ceremony was also attended by representatives from the Transportation Ministry, Melli Bank, and Khatam-ol Anbiya’, the Revolutionary Guards’ construction corporation. According to Iranian media reports, the Transportation Ministry will be responsible for about half of the project, while the other half will be shared by Melli Bank and Khatam-ol Anbiya’. The estimated cost of the project is 13-15 billion dollars.

In a speech given at the ceremony, Ahmadinejad praised all those involved in the project, mainly the Khatam-ol Anbiya’ corporation. The president said that the country’s development is the greatest mission of the Iranian people and may be an example for the rest of the world to follow. Speaking about the Revolutionary Guards’ construction corporation, which is involved in the project, the president said that “the revolutionary forces of Khatam-ol Anbiya’” fulfill an admirable part in the development of the country, maintaining speed, high quality, and low costs throughout the execution of the projects (www.president.ir, October 9)

Khatam-ol Anbiya’ commander Rostam Qasemi said at the ceremony that the highway between Qom and Mashhad will be the largest ever in Iran and in the whole world. He had praise for the president and his government for launching the project, saying that the Revolutionary Guards’ construction corporation will continue its involvement in projects for the development of the country. According to Qasemi, the corporation under his command is currently responsible for constructing about 3500 mi of highways and over one thousand miles of railways across Iran (Fars, October 9).

Khatam-ol Anbiya’ was established in 1989, following the Iran-Iraq War, to help rebuild the country. After the war, the corporation expanded into construction, transportation, industry, agriculture, gas, and petroleum. In recent years, the corporation has won billions of dollars’ worth of tenders in various fields, including the construction of dams, water supply systems, highways, tunnels, and petroleum and gas pipelines, as well as the development of oil and gas fields. There are currently over 800 firms in the corporation. Last November, the corporation won a $2.5-billion tender to construct a railroad network in the free trade zone in Chabahar (southeast Iran). Several months ago it was reported that the development of several phases in the South Fars oil field was awarded to the corporation after Turkey, the Dutch Shell and the Spanish Repsol pulled out their investment in the expansion of the oil field. The corporation’s increasing penetration into the Iranian economy has been criticized by various members of the Iranian political system, who have spoken out against the increasing involvement of the Revolutionary Guards in the economy

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Both sides claim victory

Source: The Meir Amit Intelligence and Terrorism Information Center

October 18, 2010

In a letter published last week by the Supreme Leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei ruled that the decision of the Azad University board of trustees to declare the university grounds as an Islamic endowment (waqf) was illegal and should therefore be revoked. Khamenei thus took President Ahmadinejad’s side in his bitter conflict with Ali-Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani, the leader of the Assembly of Experts and the Expediency Discernment Council. In his letter, Khamenei stated that legal teams that looked into the religious and legal aspects of the decision made by the board of trustees found it to be legally problematic and that the board was not authorized to make it.

On the other hand, the Supreme Leader also instructed to reexamine amendments recently introduced in the Azad University regulations by the Supreme Council of the Cultural Revolution, headed by President Ahmadinejad, whose aim was to increase government involvement in the university’s affairs (Mehr, October 11).

The dispute over Azad University between Ahmadinejad and Rafsanjani, who is also chairman of the university board of trustees, has been going on since Ahmadinejad’s election for president in 2005. Ahmadinejad claimed that Rafsanjani and those board members closely associated with him took advantage of their position to promote political interests, going as far as to accuse them of corruption. After the last presidential election, the president accused Rafsanjani and university president Abdollah Jasbi, considered to be Rafsanjani’s political ally, of using university resources to help reformist opposition leader Mir-Hossein Mousavi. According to sources close to the president, the university directors actively and publicly endorsed Mousavi’s candidacy and even organized students for political activity to support him.

To restrict the government’s ability to interfere with university affairs, the board of trustees announced about a year ago a decision to declare the university’s property an Islamic endowment. The purpose of such a declaration was to keep the government from taking over the university and its property. After the decision was announced, the president, in his capacity as chief of the Supreme Council of the Cultural Revolution, made two amendments in the university regulations. The amendments were aimed to significantly increase the power of government representatives and the president-led council in university affairs at the expense of its board of trustees. The amendments also put a limit on the tenure of Abdollah Jasbi, the current president of the university.

By deciding to revoke the decision made by the university board of trustees to turn university property into a “waqf”, the Supreme Leader took Ahmadinejad’s side in his conflict with Rafsanjani. His demand to abolish the change made to the university regulations by the Supreme Council of the Cultural Revolution, however, will likely severely diminish the government’s ability to meddle in university affairs in the future, and is therefore considered to be an achievement for Rafsanjani. Once again it appears, therefore, that in the current political conflict the Supreme Leader avoided categorically taking the side of either of the two political opponents.

Following Khamenei’s ruling, Rafsanjani’s website published a fragment from a press interview given by Rafsanjani several months ago, in which he claimed that Ayatollah Khomeini, the founder of the Islamic revolution, had supported his initiative to establish an independent, non-government-run university (Aftab, October 12).

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Design by Alexandra Polk

Mission Statement : The Green and Cedar Revolutions Reject Ahmedinijad & Hezbollah

October 17, 2010

Source: Green Cedars Facebook page

The World Council for the Cedars Revolution (WCCR) and the International Council for the Green Movement (ICGM) of Iran have issued the following joint statement: The WCCR and the ICGW, representing the legitimate aspirations of millions of Lebanese and Iranians around the world denounce vigorously the visit by Iran’s President Mahmoud Ahmedinijad to Lebanon last week. The Two Democratic Revolutions in Iran and Lebanon declare their rejection of the Khomeinist regime attempts to export fascism and oppression to another Middle Eastern country, victim of Hezbollah terrorism and adventurism. The Iranian regime has been funding the formation and the expansion of a Terror organization named Hezbollah with Petrodollars taken away from the basic needs of the Iranian people and spent on a network of militias abusing the Lebanese people. We, free Iranians and Lebanese around the world do not consider Ahmedinijad who came to Lebanon’s doorstep, neither a man of peace nor prosperity for Iran which is his own country. So how can he bring peace and prosperity to Lebanon, the country whose Cedar Movement fought so bravely for it’s liberation from the occupation of Syria.

Ahmadinejad stole the Iranian people’s votes in 2009 and has tried, however unsuccessfully to quash the Green Movement of the people of Iran. Through his proxies in Lebanon he is trying to bribe and steal the trust of the Lebanese people and quash the heart of the Cedar Revolution.

His intention is not to help Lebanon, just as his intention is not to serve Iran. His firebrand declarations against other Arab nations will ultimately bring nothing more than the same imprisonment and torture experienced by innocent Iranians, to Lebanon.

His calls for regional war, aim at using Lebanon as a frontline trench and the Lebanese people as his soldiers to fuel a deadly conflict and destroy the chances for Peace.

The money that Iran’s regime has given to buy the loyalty of the Hezbollah’s membership in Bint Jbeil, in order to welcome Ahmedinijad has left Iranians who are the rightful owners of that money, hungry and destitute.The Lebanese people reject Ahmedinijad and his regime and embrace the Iranian People; the Iranian people reject Hezbollah’s terrorists and embrace the Lebanese People We the representatives and supporters of the Two Revolutions around the world call on the Lebanese and Iranian peoples and their friends around the world to continue the struggle for freedom in Iran and Lebanon until the region is liberated from the oppression of these terror forces.

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Source: The Green Voice of Freedom (GVF)

October 15, 2010

In a letter to the head of the Lebanese militant group Hezbollah, the former Secretary-General of the Islamic Iran Participation Front Mohammad Reza Khatami has criticised the stance of the resistance group with regards to Ahmadinejad as well as the crackdowns carried out by Iranian authorities after the fraudulent 2009 Presidential election.

The publication of the letter comes as Mahmoud Ahmadinejad is on two-day visit to Lebanon. Many in Iran’s opposition camp see the visit as an attempt to divert attention from his administration’s domestic problems and his growing unpopularity among Iranians as well as his own ultra-conservative allies.

“You and all knowledgeable people are aware of [Ahmadinejad's] standing in the eyes of the people of Iran,” says the letter which was first published on IIPF’s official website Norooz. “These days, you and [the rest of ] Lebanon are the hosts of Mr Mahmoud Ahmadinejad as the President of the Islamic Republic of Iran. This warm welcome is a sign of the two countries’ profound ties and surely, based on the policy of non-interference in the internal affairs and the national interests of Lebanon as well as the important interests of the resistance, his reception, as the representative of the Islamic Republic, is comprehensible for us as Iranians.”

“I am addressing you, a person for whom the future of the Islamic Republic is as important as the future of the [Islamic] resistance [in Lebanon] and I see it necessary to remind [you] of a bitter reality that we are faced with in Iran today. A reality whose consequences will have to be borne by all supporters of Imam [Khomeini] and the [Islamic] Revolution, regardless of their nationality.”

The former deputy speaker of the Iranian parliament and grandson-in-law of the late Imam Khomeini stated that “hundreds” of the “true” followers of the late Ayatollah and the Islamic Revolution are under the “most severe kind of pressure and the most limitations” in the “worst conditions in prison.”

“The latest among these [followers] who was arrested just ahead of Mr Ahmadinejad’s visit [to Lebanon] and his meeting with you, is Dr Shakouri Rad, someone you are well familiar with, as one of the most important defenders of the Islamic Resistance [in Lebanon],” continued Khatami.

Shakouri Rad, a member of the IIPF and a former Member of Parliament, was arrested on 12 October due to the publication of an article on his personal blog about Gholamhossein Mohseni Eje’i, Iran’s current Prosecutor General and the Judiciary’s Spokesperson. Eje’i was Minister of Intelligence during the disputed 2009 presidential election and oversaw the mass-arrest of political activists following the monumental fraud that occurred in the June election. Shakouri Rad’s article titled “Judicial scandal, contradictions and new lies,” called on Mohseni Eje’i to leave the Judiciary citing the Prosecutor’s remarks regarding the dissolution of two reformist political parties, the Islamic Iran Participation Front and the Islamic Revolution Mujahidin Organisation.

Khatami, who is currently a member of the central council of the IIPF reminded Seyed Hassan Nassrallah, that “in our opinion, one cannot speak of resistance against the occupying regime [of Israel] and [at the same time] arrest such committed individuals … One cannot claim resistance against the Zionist Regime and at the same time refuse to denounce the injustice against these true fighters, or even worse, to approve of these actions with a satisfying silence.”

In the end, Khatami said that the Iranian nation expected “all those who claim to be resisting tyranny” to urge the Iranian authorities to “cease their oppression and transgression” and to treat Iranian people in a manner which is reflective of what they wish upon the people of Lebanon and its fighters.

Following the 2009 presidential election in Iran, many of the IIPF’s most prominent members were arrested and paraded in televised mass show-trials after which many received long jail-terms and heavy suspensions. The party’s Secretary General Mohsen Mirdamadi is among the many names currently in the prisons of the Islamic Republic serving his unjust prison sentence.

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Iranian regime’s proxy thugs: “Both Gaza and Lebanon, forget about the people of Iran”

* * Unnamed Mathematics university professor fired from his position for insulting ‘all that is sacred’. Basiji students at the Dr. Chamran University in the south western city of Ahvaz issued a proclamation against said professor claiming that he had insulted “various aspects of the leadership’s paradigm” and Dr. Chamran himself. Other accusations against this professor are that he has said that “he can prove that there are contradictions in the Qor’an and that some of the Islamic allegories originate in Judaism”. Beyond these points reportedly he has criticized the Iranian regime’s violence and brutality as well.

The proclamation issued by the firebrand Basij students has also called for the termination of all other university professors who are known to have made similar comments and whose beliefs are not in keeping with that of the Iranian regime.

* * Last week it was the Jews that were conspiring against the regime’s welfare, this week it’s the Baha’is, next week it will be someone else…but never they themsevles. In an editorial, the Revolutionary Guard website, Javaan Online complains: “The gold merchant strike around the country is being organized and perpetrated by the Baha’i community. A number of the gold merchants belonging to the blasphemous Baha’i cult have supported the devious opposition movement following last years election. Various investigations of the gold merchants’ strike have lead to three individuals, all of whom are residents of the United States and who are known to have threatened Tehrans gold merchants; the gold merchants were intimidated into continuing their support for the strike, otherwise no gold would be sold to them for their business purposes.”

Ali-Reza Afshar

* * Iranian regime officials have announced that non-governmental organizations (NGOs) cannot have any involvement in political activities. Ali-Reza Afshar, deputy to the social division of the Ministry of Interior said: “NGOs should not engage in any political activity. They can by all means criticize government bodies in private meetings but it is not acceptable that they engage in discrediting the government in the media and that they should be warned against falling in enemy traps. The ministry of interior intends to establish a more vigilant monitoring of the government and the NGOs.”

Following the June 2009 fraudulent elections, the Iranian judiciary has claimed that the NGOs have played a direct role in fomenting turmoil. The statement by the prosecutor’s office described the role of NGOs saying: “Our regime’s enemies create and support NGOs both financially and intrinsically to create different social layers and to take advantage of their potentialities in appropriate times.”

Heydar Moslehi

In September, Heydar Moslehi, Minister of Intelligence and Security (MOIS) claimed: “The leaders of sedition have received financial assistance from foreign countries, that had been made through NGOs and organizations that collaborated with these individuals. These kinds of funds did not happen only during the elections but had been made over time and they wanted to glean the results during the elections.”

Iranian regime authorities have labeled Karoubi and Mousavi, the leaders of the opposition movement to the fraudulent election, as sedition leaders.

* * A group of dissident Iranian clerics, the Clerics and Seminarians of Qom and Najaf (Motghan), issued an open letter at the threshold of Iran’s Supreme Leader, Ayatollah Khamenei’s trip to Qom and warned the community of clerics that meeting with the leader is tantamount to lauding the Iranian regime authorities crimes and contradicting Islamic principles. Motghan website reports that since the news of Khamenei’s trip was announced, Qom has been under strict security. The hope is that their letter affects Khamenei and lead him to repent from his sins against the people. The clerics and seminarians of Qom and Najaf anticipating possible accusation from the Iranian regime, stress that they are not “foreign elements” and are “deeply concerned about Iran’s national security and independence.”

The letter repeats the allegations of vote fraud in the 2009 presidential elections and maintains that based on new evidence surfacing everyday regarding the elections, the Supreme Leader is “directly responsible for this crime and great betrayal.”  They also condemn the treatment of political detainees in the aftermath of the election protests.  The dissident clerics accuse the Iranian regime of discrediting the clergy amongst the people and urge the establishment and Khamenei to reconsider their methods.

* * Iranian regime to launch a ‘prisons’ TV cable channel. Given the ever increasing number of prisoners in Iran, the Bureau of Prisons has come up with a TV channel with special programming for prisoners. This channel will broadcast speeches from all of the Iranian officials and leadership as well as educational programming that will all be based in Qor’anic Hadiths. Regarding this concept, the director of the Dar’ol Qor’an (Qor’anic institutions) in prisons said: “We are dedicated to the promotion and advancement of Qor’anic culture and teaching; this is one of our main goals in the bureau.” At present several prisons are broadcasting test runs.

]]> http://planet-iran.com/index.php/news/25640/feed 1 http://planet-iran.com/index.php/news/25635 http://planet-iran.com/index.php/news/25635#comments Sat, 16 Oct 2010 13:07:00 +0000 Zand-Bon http://planet-iran.com/?p=25635

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October 16, 2010