Given the ongoing conflict between Ahmadinejad and the Majlis, Khaemenei has created a body to help resolve disputes:
Iran's top leader has appointed a mediator to resolve an ongoing dispute between the president and parliament that has also challenged his own authority.
The official IRNA news agency says Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei named his ally and former judiciary chief Ayatollah Mahmoud Shahroudi to head an arbitration body that will tackle controversies within the ruling system.
The only problem with this new body headed by Shahroudi? It completely ignores the existing Expediency Counsel and by extension its role in the Constitution which is to resolve disputes. Instead of turning to an existing body mandated by the Constitution to deal with a problem, Khamenei under his own authority simply creates a similiar body headed by his cronies.
The reason is obvious since Rafsanjani heads the Expediency Counsel and he has been marganialized for not completely falling behind Khamenei's power. This is just another example of how Iran is being run by the decrees of men and not by the letter of the law.
Tuesday, July 26, 2011
Monday, July 25, 2011
What Is to Be Done in Iran?
It has been over two years since protests rocked the very foundations of the Islamic Republic of Iran really for the first time since the 1979 revolution that created it. In that time period, the regime has brutally suppressed all internal dissent including the house arrest of the two main leaders of the Green Movement that led the protests, Mir Hossein Mousavi and Mehdi Karroubi. Yet even in this dark hour for those who want to change Iran for the better, flickers of hope are seen through the so called "Arab Spring" next door to Iran in which the people of the region have exploded in revolutionary change that is transforming their countries.
Now to be blunt given the lack of change towards substantial change in the Islamic Republic, the question turns to what is to be done in Iran?
It is easy to sit back and argue that the regime will eventually collapse because of its own internal conflicts and contradictions. Indeed the recent conflict between Supreme Leader Khamenei and President Ahmadinejad makes it seem that the regime will destroy itself. Yet it seems that conflict within the regime has sprung up only because all internal threats have gone away. Now that the ruling elite have consolidated power, they are fighting for the spoils themselves. Once the regime faces a threat, these adversarial currents in the regime will quickly unite once more to secure their power.
Thus as tempting as it might be, we cannot sit around waiting for the regime to destroy itself. Unfortunately, I feel like that is the prevailing mood among those who are understandably frustrated at the lack of progress in changing Iran. At a certain point, we must all live in normalcy and cannot devote all our time and energy to one cause when we do not see much progress. All this is understandable, but we must also live with the consequences as I have predicted that the regime will not simply collapse on its own.
If we recognize this fact and determine to once again try to bring about change, there are two options.
One is to continue on the path started in the aftermath of the June 2009 presidential election that led to such massive protests. While this movement was able to unite disparate parts of the Iranian opposition and challenge the very foundations of the regime, we cannot pretend it is the same as 2009 after two years of little change.
I believe the fundamental problem with the state of things is that the current move in to change Iran that emerged in June 2009 was created in opposition to something. Opposition to the current manifestation of the Islamic Republic and in opposition to the the stolen presidential election. This all makes perfect sense, but it was more of a spontaneous outpouring of anger at the regime as opposed to a movement to truly change Iran for decades to come.
The time has come to recognize this fact and stop thinking that we are continuing what has started in June 2009. We must start something new to truly change Iran for the better. We must not simply be in opposition to the regime, but we must also be for something else: an Iran after the current regime.
Several attempts were made after the protests of 2009 to outline general principles that the opposition stood for and that could help shape a future Iran. However, the most important questions about overall regime change and secularism were largely avoided in order to create cohesion.
I was willing to go along with this approach because I believed and still believe that in that moment in history, a big tent approach was best. The ruling elite were shaken with the power of the protests and we needed to see if things could have changed at that moment in history. Sadly it seems that approach did not work and the regime has been able to survive.
You can only sustain people's opposition for so long before if that opposition fails, the people no longer continue opposing. In order to peek the people's interest and truly inspire them, there must be a positive vision for Iran and we must propose what we are for after the current regime is gone. That is what Khomeini understood before the 1979 revolution in which created a vision for a new Islamic state in Iran. He did not simply say that the Shah must go, but he also outlined what he wanted for Iran. He was able to capture the people's attention and lead a revolution even though his experiment ended horribly wrong.
We too must capture the attention of the people of Iran by outlining more radical change and presenting a better vision for Iran. The time for small steps and simple reforms is over because the regime has been unwilling to undergo any change. Had the ruling elite been open to compromise perhaps the reforming approach may have worked, but that is not the case.
First we must not let the people believe that they must suffer the sacrifice of a revolution simply to create an Islamic Republic-lite, largely the same but just not as harsh. As well intentioned as some of the creators of the Islamic Republic of Iran were and those reformers who believe in its concept, the current regime has failed on many counts.
A new Iran will respect Islam as a core part of society for millions of Iranians and it will never be hostile to religious freedom, but it cannot be the Islamic Republic of Iran. There should be a secular, democratic, constitutional Iran with no Supreme Leader or Monarch. Elections will determine the leaders of the state and there will be an independent judiciary to hear all complaints. No one is above the law and no one has authority from God or any other source. All power is derived by the people, all power is exercised for the people. Foreign powers are not welcome to run the affairs of Iran, but neither are internal dictators who only care about their own power and wealth.
A new economic model for Iran must also be presented in which corruption is rooted out and the trillions of dollars of Iran's oil wealth will not be squandered. Everyone will have the opportunity to pursue their economic goals without harassment from the state and everyone will be guaranteed a basic standard of living. The money in the state coffers do not belong to the rulers of Iran, but they belong to the Iranian people and should be treated as such. The idea that the poor of Iran will not support a secular regime will change when they realize that it is only through a fair and democratic system will their economic situation improve not by token subsidies, but by real economic transformation.
We do not need the previous leaders of the reform opposition to approve any of these things. They must decide what type of Iran they want to live in and what side they are on. If they are not part of the future, then they must get out of the way.
All this will be hard work both to get rid of the current regime and to create an ideal Iran that we all want. We must use the internet and social media not just to vent and inform, but to organize and bring about real change. We have to create civic societies and work towards the Iran we want to create. Many have started this project with invaluable contributions, but it has felt as if we must work within the existing structure. We must remember that we create the structure of society and it does not create us.
We must move forward as if this free, democratic, and prosperous Iran will become a reality and is not just a dream. If we start to organize our people and our society in parallel to the regime, then we will eventually get to the Iran we want. In other words, we do not overthrow the regime and then build a better Iran. Instead we build a better Iran and then overthrow the regime. This will also ensure that the ensuing revolution does not get hijacked like the previous revolution.
I do not have all the answers and the solutions will not come from me or any single individual, but from you. I simply am calling for action that will fundamentally transform Iranian society from where it is now to where we want to take it.
All this sounds easy of paper, but I recognize it will be difficult to put into action. But the alternative is to live a life that is devoid of any hope for freedom, a better economy, or a better future. Tyrants come and go in Iranian history, but it is always the Iranian people and nation that will remain. A Free Green Iran is no longer a fantasy, but it exists today and going forward if we are willing to work for it.
Now to be blunt given the lack of change towards substantial change in the Islamic Republic, the question turns to what is to be done in Iran?
It is easy to sit back and argue that the regime will eventually collapse because of its own internal conflicts and contradictions. Indeed the recent conflict between Supreme Leader Khamenei and President Ahmadinejad makes it seem that the regime will destroy itself. Yet it seems that conflict within the regime has sprung up only because all internal threats have gone away. Now that the ruling elite have consolidated power, they are fighting for the spoils themselves. Once the regime faces a threat, these adversarial currents in the regime will quickly unite once more to secure their power.
Thus as tempting as it might be, we cannot sit around waiting for the regime to destroy itself. Unfortunately, I feel like that is the prevailing mood among those who are understandably frustrated at the lack of progress in changing Iran. At a certain point, we must all live in normalcy and cannot devote all our time and energy to one cause when we do not see much progress. All this is understandable, but we must also live with the consequences as I have predicted that the regime will not simply collapse on its own.
If we recognize this fact and determine to once again try to bring about change, there are two options.
One is to continue on the path started in the aftermath of the June 2009 presidential election that led to such massive protests. While this movement was able to unite disparate parts of the Iranian opposition and challenge the very foundations of the regime, we cannot pretend it is the same as 2009 after two years of little change.
I believe the fundamental problem with the state of things is that the current move in to change Iran that emerged in June 2009 was created in opposition to something. Opposition to the current manifestation of the Islamic Republic and in opposition to the the stolen presidential election. This all makes perfect sense, but it was more of a spontaneous outpouring of anger at the regime as opposed to a movement to truly change Iran for decades to come.
The time has come to recognize this fact and stop thinking that we are continuing what has started in June 2009. We must start something new to truly change Iran for the better. We must not simply be in opposition to the regime, but we must also be for something else: an Iran after the current regime.
Several attempts were made after the protests of 2009 to outline general principles that the opposition stood for and that could help shape a future Iran. However, the most important questions about overall regime change and secularism were largely avoided in order to create cohesion.
I was willing to go along with this approach because I believed and still believe that in that moment in history, a big tent approach was best. The ruling elite were shaken with the power of the protests and we needed to see if things could have changed at that moment in history. Sadly it seems that approach did not work and the regime has been able to survive.
You can only sustain people's opposition for so long before if that opposition fails, the people no longer continue opposing. In order to peek the people's interest and truly inspire them, there must be a positive vision for Iran and we must propose what we are for after the current regime is gone. That is what Khomeini understood before the 1979 revolution in which created a vision for a new Islamic state in Iran. He did not simply say that the Shah must go, but he also outlined what he wanted for Iran. He was able to capture the people's attention and lead a revolution even though his experiment ended horribly wrong.
We too must capture the attention of the people of Iran by outlining more radical change and presenting a better vision for Iran. The time for small steps and simple reforms is over because the regime has been unwilling to undergo any change. Had the ruling elite been open to compromise perhaps the reforming approach may have worked, but that is not the case.
First we must not let the people believe that they must suffer the sacrifice of a revolution simply to create an Islamic Republic-lite, largely the same but just not as harsh. As well intentioned as some of the creators of the Islamic Republic of Iran were and those reformers who believe in its concept, the current regime has failed on many counts.
A new Iran will respect Islam as a core part of society for millions of Iranians and it will never be hostile to religious freedom, but it cannot be the Islamic Republic of Iran. There should be a secular, democratic, constitutional Iran with no Supreme Leader or Monarch. Elections will determine the leaders of the state and there will be an independent judiciary to hear all complaints. No one is above the law and no one has authority from God or any other source. All power is derived by the people, all power is exercised for the people. Foreign powers are not welcome to run the affairs of Iran, but neither are internal dictators who only care about their own power and wealth.
A new economic model for Iran must also be presented in which corruption is rooted out and the trillions of dollars of Iran's oil wealth will not be squandered. Everyone will have the opportunity to pursue their economic goals without harassment from the state and everyone will be guaranteed a basic standard of living. The money in the state coffers do not belong to the rulers of Iran, but they belong to the Iranian people and should be treated as such. The idea that the poor of Iran will not support a secular regime will change when they realize that it is only through a fair and democratic system will their economic situation improve not by token subsidies, but by real economic transformation.
We do not need the previous leaders of the reform opposition to approve any of these things. They must decide what type of Iran they want to live in and what side they are on. If they are not part of the future, then they must get out of the way.
All this will be hard work both to get rid of the current regime and to create an ideal Iran that we all want. We must use the internet and social media not just to vent and inform, but to organize and bring about real change. We have to create civic societies and work towards the Iran we want to create. Many have started this project with invaluable contributions, but it has felt as if we must work within the existing structure. We must remember that we create the structure of society and it does not create us.
We must move forward as if this free, democratic, and prosperous Iran will become a reality and is not just a dream. If we start to organize our people and our society in parallel to the regime, then we will eventually get to the Iran we want. In other words, we do not overthrow the regime and then build a better Iran. Instead we build a better Iran and then overthrow the regime. This will also ensure that the ensuing revolution does not get hijacked like the previous revolution.
I do not have all the answers and the solutions will not come from me or any single individual, but from you. I simply am calling for action that will fundamentally transform Iranian society from where it is now to where we want to take it.
All this sounds easy of paper, but I recognize it will be difficult to put into action. But the alternative is to live a life that is devoid of any hope for freedom, a better economy, or a better future. Tyrants come and go in Iranian history, but it is always the Iranian people and nation that will remain. A Free Green Iran is no longer a fantasy, but it exists today and going forward if we are willing to work for it.
Wednesday, June 1, 2011
Haleh Sahabi Murdered at Father's Funeral
Here is the story:
The daughter of a prominent veteran Iranian dissident has died after reportedly scuffling with security forces at his funeral.
Haleh Sahabi, 54, also an opposition activist and women's rights campaigner, had been allowed out of prison to attend the funeral of her father, Ezatollah Sahabi, on Wednesday. She fell to the ground in the scuffle and died of a cardiac arrest, according to the opposition website Kaleme.
The semi-official Fars news agency confirmed Sahabi's death but denied there had been a clash with police and accused the opposition movement of seeking to politicise the incident.
"Fars reporters present at the funeral service said there was no clash between the mourners and security forces," it said.
Alireza Janeh, head of security matters at the Tehran governor's office, said there were no clashes and that Sahabi had died of heart problems exacerbated by stress and hot weather at his funeral.
Sahabi's death is likely to anger women's rights campaigners and supporters of Iran's opposition movement, whose massive street protests after the re-election of President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad in 2009 were crushed by the government and whose leaders have been put under house arrest.
Sahabi was arrested during the post-election crackdown and was given a two-year jail sentence.
"Security forces tried to interfere in the carrying of the body, she objected and security forces confronted her and other people present," Kaleme said, adding that Sahabi was pushed to the ground. Another opposition site, Sahamnews, said security forces punched her in the stomach.
Kaleme said she was holding a picture of her father to her chest and fell when security forces tried to take it from her. "She fell and did not get up," it said.
Prominent opposition figures and former moderate officials attended the ceremony in the north-eastern Tehran suburb of Lavasan for Ezatollah Sahabi, who was jailed both before and after the 1979 Islamic revolution and spent a total of 15 years in prison.
Friday, May 6, 2011
Regime Collapsing From Within?
The regime itself might remove Ahmadinejad if this continues:
Close allies of Iran's president, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, have been accused of using supernatural powers to further his policies amid an increasingly bitter power struggle between him and the country's supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei.
Several people said to be close to the president and his chief of staff, Esfandiar Rahim Mashaei, have been arrested in recent days and charged with being "magicians" and invoking djinns (spirits).
Ayandeh, an Iranian news website, described one of the arrested men, Abbas Ghaffari, as "a man with special skills in metaphysics and connections with the unknown worlds".
The arrests come amid a growing rift between Ahmadinejad and Khamenei which has prompted several MPs to call for the president to be impeached.
On Sunday, Ahmadinejad returned to his office after an 11-day walkout in an apparent protest over Khamenei's reinstatement of the intelligence minister, who the president had initiallyasked to resign.
Ahmadinejad's unprecedented disobedience prompted harsh criticism from conservatives who warned that he might face the fate of Abdulhassan Banisadr, Iran's first post-revolution president who was impeached and exiled for allegedly attempting to undermine clerical power.
Ayatollah Mesbah Yazdi, a hardline cleric close to Khamenei, warned that disobeying the supreme leader – who has the ultimate power in Iran – is equivalent to "apostasy from God".
Ahmadinejad has so far declined to officially back Khamenei's ruling over Heydar Moslehi, the minister at the centre of the row. In the first cabinet meeting since the president returned, Moslehi was absent.
Khamenei's supporters believe that the top-level confrontation stems from the increasing influence of Mashaei, an opponent of greater involvement of clerics in politics, who is being groomed by Ahmadinejad as a possible successor.
But the feud has taken a metaphysical turn following the release of an Iranian documentary alleging the imminent return of the Hidden Imam Mahdi – the revered saviour of Shia Islam, whose reappearance is anticipated by believers in a manner comparable to that with which Christian fundamentalists anticipate the second coming of Jesus.
Conservative clerics, who say that the Mahdi's return cannot be predicted, have accused a "deviant current" within the president's inner circle, including Mashaei, of being responsible for the film.
Ahmadinejad's obsession with the hidden imam is well known. He often refers to him in his speeches and in 2009 said that he had documentary evidence that the US was trying to prevent Mahdi's return.
Since Ahmadinejad's return this week, at least 25 people, who are believed to be close to Mashaei, have been arrested. Among them is Abbas Amirifar, head of the government's cultural committee and some journalists of Mashaei's recently launched newspaper, Haft-e-Sobh.
On Saturday, Mojtaba Zolnour, Khamenei's deputy representative in the powerful Revolutionary Guard, said: "Today Mashaei is the actual president. Mr Ahmadinejad has held on to a decaying rope by relying on Mashaei."
Several people said to be close to the president and his chief of staff, Esfandiar Rahim Mashaei, have been arrested in recent days and charged with being "magicians" and invoking djinns (spirits).
Ayandeh, an Iranian news website, described one of the arrested men, Abbas Ghaffari, as "a man with special skills in metaphysics and connections with the unknown worlds".
The arrests come amid a growing rift between Ahmadinejad and Khamenei which has prompted several MPs to call for the president to be impeached.
On Sunday, Ahmadinejad returned to his office after an 11-day walkout in an apparent protest over Khamenei's reinstatement of the intelligence minister, who the president had initiallyasked to resign.
Ahmadinejad's unprecedented disobedience prompted harsh criticism from conservatives who warned that he might face the fate of Abdulhassan Banisadr, Iran's first post-revolution president who was impeached and exiled for allegedly attempting to undermine clerical power.
Ayatollah Mesbah Yazdi, a hardline cleric close to Khamenei, warned that disobeying the supreme leader – who has the ultimate power in Iran – is equivalent to "apostasy from God".
Ahmadinejad has so far declined to officially back Khamenei's ruling over Heydar Moslehi, the minister at the centre of the row. In the first cabinet meeting since the president returned, Moslehi was absent.
Khamenei's supporters believe that the top-level confrontation stems from the increasing influence of Mashaei, an opponent of greater involvement of clerics in politics, who is being groomed by Ahmadinejad as a possible successor.
But the feud has taken a metaphysical turn following the release of an Iranian documentary alleging the imminent return of the Hidden Imam Mahdi – the revered saviour of Shia Islam, whose reappearance is anticipated by believers in a manner comparable to that with which Christian fundamentalists anticipate the second coming of Jesus.
Conservative clerics, who say that the Mahdi's return cannot be predicted, have accused a "deviant current" within the president's inner circle, including Mashaei, of being responsible for the film.
Ahmadinejad's obsession with the hidden imam is well known. He often refers to him in his speeches and in 2009 said that he had documentary evidence that the US was trying to prevent Mahdi's return.
Since Ahmadinejad's return this week, at least 25 people, who are believed to be close to Mashaei, have been arrested. Among them is Abbas Amirifar, head of the government's cultural committee and some journalists of Mashaei's recently launched newspaper, Haft-e-Sobh.
On Saturday, Mojtaba Zolnour, Khamenei's deputy representative in the powerful Revolutionary Guard, said: "Today Mashaei is the actual president. Mr Ahmadinejad has held on to a decaying rope by relying on Mashaei."
Thursday, April 21, 2011
Conflict in the Islamic Republic
Excellent Article about the recent bitter conflict between Khamenei and Ahmadinejad:
The ongoing skirmish over the Islamic Republic of Iran's Ministry of Intelligence reveals the latest alignment of forces in the country and exposes a hidden war between its intelligence services.
The Islamic Republic is famously a state where there is never a dearth of political surprises. The model has almost invariably been as follows: one spectacular event creates an enormous splash, followed by smaller ripples until things subside back to "normalcy."
Thus it is with more than a little bafflement that we must greet the staggering onrush of developments in the last few days. For in the row over who should head the Ministry of Intelligence, we are dealing with not one but several major surprising twists and turns.
In addition to the first major events -- President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's decree announcing the resignation of the intelligence minister and Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei's surprisingly forceful overriding of that decree -- there have been two other equally important developments: an attack of unprecedented vehemence by a newspaper subsidiary of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps on the presidential camp, and an equally unprecedented counterattack by a website closely aligned with Ahmadinejad on the Revolutionary Guards.
The First Surprise
In the year-and-a-half-long tug of war between Ahmadinejad and the Supreme Leader over ministerial positions nominally and partly under the sway of the Leader, the tussle over the Intelligence Ministry should be regarded as a mild sea change. For by overruling Ahmadinejad's effective sacking of Minister of Intelligence Heydar Moslehi, Khamenei did what he had been reluctant to do in the recent past: he has stood his ground and fought back.
With one exception, in all the earlier skirmishes -- including those over the Culture, Interior, and Foreign Affairs ministries -- the Leader gave up more or less without a fight. The exception was the position of intelligence minister, arguably the most coveted post in the entire cabinet. In this case, as of a year and a half ago, Ahmadinejad knew he wasn't yet strong enough to exert full control. He thus agreed to a compromise candidate, the wily Moslehi, a cleric with links to the Leader's office but closer in both sensibility and vision to the up-and-coming young hardliners.
If the Supreme Leader had hoped that Ahmadinejad's insatiable appetite for power would be assuaged by having a broadly like-minded hardliner at the helm of the ministry, he was sorely mistaken. The post is too valuable an asset, and observers believe Ahmadinejad will not rest content until he has full control over the ministry.
This is not hard to understand given the pervasive presence of the Intelligence Ministry in every facet of life in the Islamic Republic and the incriminating information held in its vaults on one and every politician in the land.
Of particular interest to the presidential camp would be information on the top members of Ahmadinejad's coterie, starting with the president himself. For example, it is believed that the Intelligence Ministry is in possession of a thick file on Ahmadinejad's shenanigans when he was chosen as the right's favored candidate in the race for governor of Ardabil province nearly 20 years ago. Observers cite that engineered victory as the true start of Ahmadinejad's meteoric rise to national politics. Aside from that prize dossier, parliamentary elections are less than a year off and the files on aspirant candidates are in high demand by each contending faction.
The First Skirmish
In the grand contest for control of the Intelligence Ministry, Ahmadinejad's first volleys were fired within days of the birth of the protest movement following the June 2009 presidential election. At the time, he claimed that the ministry under Gholam-Hossein Mohseni Ejei had failed, dismally, to predict the outbreak of protests and then to finger the real culprits in the so-called "sedition." According to a speech by Safar Harandi, former culture minister and now an Ahmadinejad adversary, the president leveled three distinct charges at the Intelligence Ministry: (1) failure to predict the "sedition," (2) failure to produce evidence of a foreign link to it, and (3) failure to demonstrate the culpability of "certain elite members" (code language for Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani). Ahmadinejad cited information from Guard intelligence to back up his charges, some of it apparently dating from before the 2009 campaign.
In retrospect, it was rather disingenuous on the part of Ahmadinejad and his allies in the Revolutionary Guards to claim they had warned of the outbreak of "sedition" in advance of the vote. The hardliners have been warning of plots and seditions from day one on the revolutionary calendar. It is even more ludicrous to claim perspicacity when they had done absolutely nothing in anticipation of those protests themselves. But the country's hardline leadership apparently went along with the charges of dereliction of duty after the spectacular flowering of the democratic movement, the likes of which had not been seen in Iran for decades.
On the basis of those alleged shortcomings, then, Mohseni Ejei was brusquely sacked in a particularly humiliating way and Moslehi was given the job after a short interregnum. A major purge subsequently took place among the ranks of the ministry's career officers including, according to the Iranian media, five vice ministers: Firoozabadi (vice minister for technology), Haj Habibollah (culture), Moiin (internal security), Mansoorzadeh, known as Mansouri (legislative liaison), and Kharazi (counterintelligence) -- their first names were not given. Their replacements came mostly from the ministry's lower ranks and in some instances from outside it. True to form, Ahmadinejad did not consult with the Supreme Leader either on the dismissals or the replacements, as had been the practice up until then.
In the first major skirmish over the ministry, Ahmadinejad had clearly made a major score but he still had some distance to go.
A New Beginning
For his part, Moslehi immediately set about "correcting" his predecessor's alleged mistakes. The Intelligence Ministry peddled the tired line that the Green Movement was a pawn in the hands of foreigners and that Rafsanjani was somehow its principal leader and strategist. Thousands of Iranians were hounded and subjected to brutal beatings and torture in search of the chimerical "information" that would corroborate these dubious allegations. The Intelligence Ministry also joined the Revolutionary Guards' intelligence division in a feverish race to prove who could better root out dissent.
So far, what Moslehi had achieved was the stated goal of the entire hardline establishment. The affinity between the intelligence minister and Ahmadinejad was more of an ideological than a factional nature -- both were for the establishment of an extreme-right dictatorship.
Significantly, though, Moslehi seems to have followed an independent line of his own. For example, wherever it benefited him, on a whole host of issues -- like the highly damaging imputation of corruption on the part of First Vice President Mohammad Reza Rahimi or the questionable activities of the Office of the Affairs of Iranians Abroad, run from the president's office -- the Intelligence Ministry took a studiously neutral stance. In some other notable cases, like the so-called "Iranian School of Thought" (Maktabe Iran), pushed vigorously by Ahmadinejad's confidant and chief ideologue Esfandiar Rahim Mashaei, Moslehi sided with the president's detractors, thus raising the ire of his boss. Like Saint Sebastian defending the faith, Mashaei is taking the arrows meant for Ahmadinejad. In the president's eyes, the distinguishing mark of loyalty to him is ineluctably fixed on the question of his son's father-in-law.
The Second Skirmish
The president's latest foray into Khamenei territory was ostensibly precipitated by the ouster of an Ahmadinejad loyalist from the Intelligence Ministry's top ranks by Moslehi. It is not clear what excuse Ahmadinejad has used this time to axe an important minister with implications for his rivalry with the Supreme Leader. Still, as in the case of former Foreign Minister Manouchehr Mottaki, the cabinet minister had little to show for his time in the post, while his personal and professional shortcomings were abundant. Since he took office, practically all of the intelligence coups were achieved by the Revolutionary Guards' intelligence division and even the single celebrated event for which he took credit -- last February's capture of Jundallah leader Abdolmalek Rigi -- turned out to be the result of a diplomatic-military understanding between the governments of Iran and Pakistan in which Moslehi's role had been, at best, ancillary. Then in October, in his first-ever impromptu interview on Iranian television, and after much pre-event publicity, he gave an exceedingly lackluster performance that greatly disappointed pro-regime viewers and delighted the opposition.
Khamenei's Turn
In this latest skirmish, Ahmadinejad seems to have committed a rare overshoot -- he was evidently not expecting a counterattack by Khamenei. This is a novelty in terms not only of the president's tactical faux pas but also the severity of the Supreme Leader's reaction.
Of course, it remains to be seen if this is a one-off incident or the beginning of a new phase in Khamenei-Ahmadinejad relations. An inkling into this came two months ago, when the Supreme Leader paid an unannounced visit to the Intelligence Ministry's headquarters. In that meeting, the Leader went out of his way to heap praise on the ministry's personnel and give his blessing to their work. This is during a period when there have been no reports of any such visits or speeches by Khamenei to Guard intelligence personnel anywhere. Things have changed from a year and a half ago when he elevated the Revolutionary Guards' intelligence unit to the highest institutional rank it has enjoyed in nearly three decades (see below). What we are witnessing is a gradual distancing of the Leader from his traditional bases of support -- like the Revolutionary Guards -- to newer centers -- like the military and the Intelligence Ministry.
Other Surprises
On April 18, the Revolutionary Guard-run newspaper Javan (one of several outlets controlled by the Guards, each with a slightly different slant) entered the fray over the Moslehi affair by effectively accusing the Ahmadinejad faction of having nefarious designs on the Intelligence Ministry. The paper darkly warned of threats posed by what it termed "unsavory elements" intent on "taking political advantage of documents and information" kept inside the ministry "as a leverage for persuasion and coercion on certain currents and certain political personalities" -- claims likely not far from the truth.
The next day, Bakeri Online, a website connected to the Ahmadinejad faction, hit back. The website claimed that it was the Revolutionary Guards' intelligence service under Hossein Taeb that had designs on the ministry and that Moslehi had compromised his position and essentially sold out his command by hiring personnel directly from the Guards' rival intelligence organization -- claims, again, likely not far from the truth. (The website has been shut down since that date.)
Together, these two events are of great significance. Until now, differences between Ahmadinejad and the Revolutionary Guards have been completely disregarded or papered over by both sides. It is highly unlikely that the row between the two ascending power centers will spiral out of control anytime soon since both sides needs the other as a counterweight against their respective adversaries. Still, there is no denying that relations between the two sides have undergone a qualitative change unlike any seen in the years before the Moslehi affair.
Intelligence Wars
Parallel with the latest head-to-head clash between the Supreme Leader and Ahmadinejad lurks a second, no less critical, conflict among Iran's top power centers: the 30-year rivalry between the Intelligence Ministry and the intelligence operation of the Revolutionary Guards.
While rivalry among intelligence services is common in every country (the conflict between the CIA and the Pentagon's intelligence service, for example, is well-documented in Bob Woodward's books on the Bush White House), due to the power that these organizations wield there are usually safeguards against openly hostile attacks by one service on the other. These rely either on the force of the law or the presence of a powerful autocrat. Not so in the Islamic Republic.
In autumn 2009, Khamenei approved a series of crucial -- some might say momentous -- personnel and structural changes affecting the Revolutionary Guards and the country as a whole. In appreciation of the successful work done by the Revolutionary Guards and the paramilitary Basij force against unarmed civilians in the streets of Tehran that summer, he elevated the Basij by combining it with the ground forces of the Revolutionary Guards, effectively making it the Guards' fifth branch. He also did something else that for intelligence watchers in Iran was of a historic nature. He raised the status of the Guards' intelligence unit from "directorate" (moavenat sepah) to full-fledged "organization." In so doing, he single-handedly contravened both the spirit and the letter of an important law that had Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini's imprimatur. The August 1983 Law on Intelligence is one of the most important pieces of legislation enacted in postrevolutionary Iran. Ratified after a bruising battle with the Revolutionary Guards and their supporters, the law specifically forbade the Guards to operate an intelligence "organization," as it previously had. The Law on Intelligence promulgated the creation of an Intelligence Ministry under the control of the elected government.
As is clear from news reports of the time, Khomeini and factions operating under the "Imam's Line" rubric were of the conviction that a military outfit like the Revolutionary Guards should not be accorded intelligence capabilities beyond what was absolutely necessary for its military needs and functioning. Understandably, Mohsen Rezaei, then head of the Revolutionary Guards, and Reza Saifollahi, then Guard intelligence chief, strongly opposed the new law. In the end, they lost as over two-thirds of the Majles deputies voted in favor of the legislation.
It is ironic that the same Khamenei who has peremptorily broken the 1983 law was in fact one of the central backers of the legislation when various factions were lobbying the Majles over it. According to Saiid Hajarian, then Prime Minister Mir Hossein Mousavi's legislative representative (who later paid with an assassin's bullet for this and other infractions), Khamenei, president at the time, argued for the bill because he felt that without the executive exercising control over intelligence and budgeting, nothing could be accomplished in the country.
Blow to the Intelligence Ministry
Aside from the legal and political niceties, the 2009 change bode ill for the Intelligence Ministry. In the Hobbesian world of Islamic Republic politics, where gains made by one group do not come ex nihilo, the new power and prerogatives bestowed by the Supreme Leader on Guard intelligence meant a corresponding diminution of the Intelligence Ministry's power. Today, as the Iranian media report great confusion and consternation among ministry personnel, moral at its rival organization is reportedly running at an all-time high. There have been countless cases in the past two years where the two outfits have clashed over operations and responsibilities, and the Guards have taken the upper hand, leaving their weaker rival in the dust.
The Revolutionary Guards' intelligence organization has been grabbing bigger budgets, broader jurisdiction, and greater official accolades since Mohammad Khatami was elected president in 1997. With Khamenei's blessing, the trend has accelerated to the point that, despite its much smaller size, it now rivals and even eclipses its civilian competitor in many regards. (After his landslide victory, Khatami undertook a purge of some Intelligence Ministry personnel guilty of murder and torture, and brought a semblance of legality to the largely unaccountable ministry -- thus prompting the hardliners to raise the profile of an alternative intelligence outfit.)
Historians would no doubt have a field day examining Moslehi's role in the ministry's decline. In his acceptance speech on the Majles floor in 2009, he said he wanted to "use the experience of the Sepah [Revolutionary Guards]" for his ministry. Aside from the illegality of the suggestion -- the Law on Intelligence strictly forbids either service to interfere in the affairs of the other -- it was a severe blow to the morale of those serving in the ministry. Moslehi could hardly have been unaware of the Law on Intelligence's prohibition against tampering with each service's independence. Bakeri Online's claim that Moselhi has directly recruited from the Revolutionary Guards' intelligence unit is credible, especially given the fact that he served for years as the Leader's representative to the Basij. The claim is also in full accord with the general cannibalization of valuable assets by the Revolutionary Guards.
There is no knowing what the immediate future holds for the badgered ministry, but one thing is for certain: Given the prevailing conditions -- a lame-duck and apparently disliked minister at the helm, a ruthless and power-hungry rival, its emergence as a target for factional political abuse, and the general degradation of its duties per the dictates of an unpopular and brutal regime -- the Intelligence Ministry will witness only further erosion and decline. On April 20, several hardline Majles deputies introduced legislation to change its status from a "ministry" to a mere "organization," thus proposing to do away with the 1983 law altogether.
The ongoing skirmish over the Islamic Republic of Iran's Ministry of Intelligence reveals the latest alignment of forces in the country and exposes a hidden war between its intelligence services.
The Islamic Republic is famously a state where there is never a dearth of political surprises. The model has almost invariably been as follows: one spectacular event creates an enormous splash, followed by smaller ripples until things subside back to "normalcy."
Thus it is with more than a little bafflement that we must greet the staggering onrush of developments in the last few days. For in the row over who should head the Ministry of Intelligence, we are dealing with not one but several major surprising twists and turns.
In addition to the first major events -- President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's decree announcing the resignation of the intelligence minister and Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei's surprisingly forceful overriding of that decree -- there have been two other equally important developments: an attack of unprecedented vehemence by a newspaper subsidiary of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps on the presidential camp, and an equally unprecedented counterattack by a website closely aligned with Ahmadinejad on the Revolutionary Guards.
The First Surprise
In the year-and-a-half-long tug of war between Ahmadinejad and the Supreme Leader over ministerial positions nominally and partly under the sway of the Leader, the tussle over the Intelligence Ministry should be regarded as a mild sea change. For by overruling Ahmadinejad's effective sacking of Minister of Intelligence Heydar Moslehi, Khamenei did what he had been reluctant to do in the recent past: he has stood his ground and fought back.
With one exception, in all the earlier skirmishes -- including those over the Culture, Interior, and Foreign Affairs ministries -- the Leader gave up more or less without a fight. The exception was the position of intelligence minister, arguably the most coveted post in the entire cabinet. In this case, as of a year and a half ago, Ahmadinejad knew he wasn't yet strong enough to exert full control. He thus agreed to a compromise candidate, the wily Moslehi, a cleric with links to the Leader's office but closer in both sensibility and vision to the up-and-coming young hardliners.
If the Supreme Leader had hoped that Ahmadinejad's insatiable appetite for power would be assuaged by having a broadly like-minded hardliner at the helm of the ministry, he was sorely mistaken. The post is too valuable an asset, and observers believe Ahmadinejad will not rest content until he has full control over the ministry.
This is not hard to understand given the pervasive presence of the Intelligence Ministry in every facet of life in the Islamic Republic and the incriminating information held in its vaults on one and every politician in the land.
Of particular interest to the presidential camp would be information on the top members of Ahmadinejad's coterie, starting with the president himself. For example, it is believed that the Intelligence Ministry is in possession of a thick file on Ahmadinejad's shenanigans when he was chosen as the right's favored candidate in the race for governor of Ardabil province nearly 20 years ago. Observers cite that engineered victory as the true start of Ahmadinejad's meteoric rise to national politics. Aside from that prize dossier, parliamentary elections are less than a year off and the files on aspirant candidates are in high demand by each contending faction.
The First Skirmish
In the grand contest for control of the Intelligence Ministry, Ahmadinejad's first volleys were fired within days of the birth of the protest movement following the June 2009 presidential election. At the time, he claimed that the ministry under Gholam-Hossein Mohseni Ejei had failed, dismally, to predict the outbreak of protests and then to finger the real culprits in the so-called "sedition." According to a speech by Safar Harandi, former culture minister and now an Ahmadinejad adversary, the president leveled three distinct charges at the Intelligence Ministry: (1) failure to predict the "sedition," (2) failure to produce evidence of a foreign link to it, and (3) failure to demonstrate the culpability of "certain elite members" (code language for Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani). Ahmadinejad cited information from Guard intelligence to back up his charges, some of it apparently dating from before the 2009 campaign.
In retrospect, it was rather disingenuous on the part of Ahmadinejad and his allies in the Revolutionary Guards to claim they had warned of the outbreak of "sedition" in advance of the vote. The hardliners have been warning of plots and seditions from day one on the revolutionary calendar. It is even more ludicrous to claim perspicacity when they had done absolutely nothing in anticipation of those protests themselves. But the country's hardline leadership apparently went along with the charges of dereliction of duty after the spectacular flowering of the democratic movement, the likes of which had not been seen in Iran for decades.
On the basis of those alleged shortcomings, then, Mohseni Ejei was brusquely sacked in a particularly humiliating way and Moslehi was given the job after a short interregnum. A major purge subsequently took place among the ranks of the ministry's career officers including, according to the Iranian media, five vice ministers: Firoozabadi (vice minister for technology), Haj Habibollah (culture), Moiin (internal security), Mansoorzadeh, known as Mansouri (legislative liaison), and Kharazi (counterintelligence) -- their first names were not given. Their replacements came mostly from the ministry's lower ranks and in some instances from outside it. True to form, Ahmadinejad did not consult with the Supreme Leader either on the dismissals or the replacements, as had been the practice up until then.
In the first major skirmish over the ministry, Ahmadinejad had clearly made a major score but he still had some distance to go.
A New Beginning
For his part, Moslehi immediately set about "correcting" his predecessor's alleged mistakes. The Intelligence Ministry peddled the tired line that the Green Movement was a pawn in the hands of foreigners and that Rafsanjani was somehow its principal leader and strategist. Thousands of Iranians were hounded and subjected to brutal beatings and torture in search of the chimerical "information" that would corroborate these dubious allegations. The Intelligence Ministry also joined the Revolutionary Guards' intelligence division in a feverish race to prove who could better root out dissent.
So far, what Moslehi had achieved was the stated goal of the entire hardline establishment. The affinity between the intelligence minister and Ahmadinejad was more of an ideological than a factional nature -- both were for the establishment of an extreme-right dictatorship.
Significantly, though, Moslehi seems to have followed an independent line of his own. For example, wherever it benefited him, on a whole host of issues -- like the highly damaging imputation of corruption on the part of First Vice President Mohammad Reza Rahimi or the questionable activities of the Office of the Affairs of Iranians Abroad, run from the president's office -- the Intelligence Ministry took a studiously neutral stance. In some other notable cases, like the so-called "Iranian School of Thought" (Maktabe Iran), pushed vigorously by Ahmadinejad's confidant and chief ideologue Esfandiar Rahim Mashaei, Moslehi sided with the president's detractors, thus raising the ire of his boss. Like Saint Sebastian defending the faith, Mashaei is taking the arrows meant for Ahmadinejad. In the president's eyes, the distinguishing mark of loyalty to him is ineluctably fixed on the question of his son's father-in-law.
The Second Skirmish
The president's latest foray into Khamenei territory was ostensibly precipitated by the ouster of an Ahmadinejad loyalist from the Intelligence Ministry's top ranks by Moslehi. It is not clear what excuse Ahmadinejad has used this time to axe an important minister with implications for his rivalry with the Supreme Leader. Still, as in the case of former Foreign Minister Manouchehr Mottaki, the cabinet minister had little to show for his time in the post, while his personal and professional shortcomings were abundant. Since he took office, practically all of the intelligence coups were achieved by the Revolutionary Guards' intelligence division and even the single celebrated event for which he took credit -- last February's capture of Jundallah leader Abdolmalek Rigi -- turned out to be the result of a diplomatic-military understanding between the governments of Iran and Pakistan in which Moslehi's role had been, at best, ancillary. Then in October, in his first-ever impromptu interview on Iranian television, and after much pre-event publicity, he gave an exceedingly lackluster performance that greatly disappointed pro-regime viewers and delighted the opposition.
Khamenei's Turn
In this latest skirmish, Ahmadinejad seems to have committed a rare overshoot -- he was evidently not expecting a counterattack by Khamenei. This is a novelty in terms not only of the president's tactical faux pas but also the severity of the Supreme Leader's reaction.
Of course, it remains to be seen if this is a one-off incident or the beginning of a new phase in Khamenei-Ahmadinejad relations. An inkling into this came two months ago, when the Supreme Leader paid an unannounced visit to the Intelligence Ministry's headquarters. In that meeting, the Leader went out of his way to heap praise on the ministry's personnel and give his blessing to their work. This is during a period when there have been no reports of any such visits or speeches by Khamenei to Guard intelligence personnel anywhere. Things have changed from a year and a half ago when he elevated the Revolutionary Guards' intelligence unit to the highest institutional rank it has enjoyed in nearly three decades (see below). What we are witnessing is a gradual distancing of the Leader from his traditional bases of support -- like the Revolutionary Guards -- to newer centers -- like the military and the Intelligence Ministry.
Other Surprises
On April 18, the Revolutionary Guard-run newspaper Javan (one of several outlets controlled by the Guards, each with a slightly different slant) entered the fray over the Moslehi affair by effectively accusing the Ahmadinejad faction of having nefarious designs on the Intelligence Ministry. The paper darkly warned of threats posed by what it termed "unsavory elements" intent on "taking political advantage of documents and information" kept inside the ministry "as a leverage for persuasion and coercion on certain currents and certain political personalities" -- claims likely not far from the truth.
The next day, Bakeri Online, a website connected to the Ahmadinejad faction, hit back. The website claimed that it was the Revolutionary Guards' intelligence service under Hossein Taeb that had designs on the ministry and that Moslehi had compromised his position and essentially sold out his command by hiring personnel directly from the Guards' rival intelligence organization -- claims, again, likely not far from the truth. (The website has been shut down since that date.)
Together, these two events are of great significance. Until now, differences between Ahmadinejad and the Revolutionary Guards have been completely disregarded or papered over by both sides. It is highly unlikely that the row between the two ascending power centers will spiral out of control anytime soon since both sides needs the other as a counterweight against their respective adversaries. Still, there is no denying that relations between the two sides have undergone a qualitative change unlike any seen in the years before the Moslehi affair.
Intelligence Wars
Parallel with the latest head-to-head clash between the Supreme Leader and Ahmadinejad lurks a second, no less critical, conflict among Iran's top power centers: the 30-year rivalry between the Intelligence Ministry and the intelligence operation of the Revolutionary Guards.
While rivalry among intelligence services is common in every country (the conflict between the CIA and the Pentagon's intelligence service, for example, is well-documented in Bob Woodward's books on the Bush White House), due to the power that these organizations wield there are usually safeguards against openly hostile attacks by one service on the other. These rely either on the force of the law or the presence of a powerful autocrat. Not so in the Islamic Republic.
In autumn 2009, Khamenei approved a series of crucial -- some might say momentous -- personnel and structural changes affecting the Revolutionary Guards and the country as a whole. In appreciation of the successful work done by the Revolutionary Guards and the paramilitary Basij force against unarmed civilians in the streets of Tehran that summer, he elevated the Basij by combining it with the ground forces of the Revolutionary Guards, effectively making it the Guards' fifth branch. He also did something else that for intelligence watchers in Iran was of a historic nature. He raised the status of the Guards' intelligence unit from "directorate" (moavenat sepah) to full-fledged "organization." In so doing, he single-handedly contravened both the spirit and the letter of an important law that had Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini's imprimatur. The August 1983 Law on Intelligence is one of the most important pieces of legislation enacted in postrevolutionary Iran. Ratified after a bruising battle with the Revolutionary Guards and their supporters, the law specifically forbade the Guards to operate an intelligence "organization," as it previously had. The Law on Intelligence promulgated the creation of an Intelligence Ministry under the control of the elected government.
As is clear from news reports of the time, Khomeini and factions operating under the "Imam's Line" rubric were of the conviction that a military outfit like the Revolutionary Guards should not be accorded intelligence capabilities beyond what was absolutely necessary for its military needs and functioning. Understandably, Mohsen Rezaei, then head of the Revolutionary Guards, and Reza Saifollahi, then Guard intelligence chief, strongly opposed the new law. In the end, they lost as over two-thirds of the Majles deputies voted in favor of the legislation.
It is ironic that the same Khamenei who has peremptorily broken the 1983 law was in fact one of the central backers of the legislation when various factions were lobbying the Majles over it. According to Saiid Hajarian, then Prime Minister Mir Hossein Mousavi's legislative representative (who later paid with an assassin's bullet for this and other infractions), Khamenei, president at the time, argued for the bill because he felt that without the executive exercising control over intelligence and budgeting, nothing could be accomplished in the country.
Blow to the Intelligence Ministry
Aside from the legal and political niceties, the 2009 change bode ill for the Intelligence Ministry. In the Hobbesian world of Islamic Republic politics, where gains made by one group do not come ex nihilo, the new power and prerogatives bestowed by the Supreme Leader on Guard intelligence meant a corresponding diminution of the Intelligence Ministry's power. Today, as the Iranian media report great confusion and consternation among ministry personnel, moral at its rival organization is reportedly running at an all-time high. There have been countless cases in the past two years where the two outfits have clashed over operations and responsibilities, and the Guards have taken the upper hand, leaving their weaker rival in the dust.
The Revolutionary Guards' intelligence organization has been grabbing bigger budgets, broader jurisdiction, and greater official accolades since Mohammad Khatami was elected president in 1997. With Khamenei's blessing, the trend has accelerated to the point that, despite its much smaller size, it now rivals and even eclipses its civilian competitor in many regards. (After his landslide victory, Khatami undertook a purge of some Intelligence Ministry personnel guilty of murder and torture, and brought a semblance of legality to the largely unaccountable ministry -- thus prompting the hardliners to raise the profile of an alternative intelligence outfit.)
Historians would no doubt have a field day examining Moslehi's role in the ministry's decline. In his acceptance speech on the Majles floor in 2009, he said he wanted to "use the experience of the Sepah [Revolutionary Guards]" for his ministry. Aside from the illegality of the suggestion -- the Law on Intelligence strictly forbids either service to interfere in the affairs of the other -- it was a severe blow to the morale of those serving in the ministry. Moslehi could hardly have been unaware of the Law on Intelligence's prohibition against tampering with each service's independence. Bakeri Online's claim that Moselhi has directly recruited from the Revolutionary Guards' intelligence unit is credible, especially given the fact that he served for years as the Leader's representative to the Basij. The claim is also in full accord with the general cannibalization of valuable assets by the Revolutionary Guards.
There is no knowing what the immediate future holds for the badgered ministry, but one thing is for certain: Given the prevailing conditions -- a lame-duck and apparently disliked minister at the helm, a ruthless and power-hungry rival, its emergence as a target for factional political abuse, and the general degradation of its duties per the dictates of an unpopular and brutal regime -- the Intelligence Ministry will witness only further erosion and decline. On April 20, several hardline Majles deputies introduced legislation to change its status from a "ministry" to a mere "organization," thus proposing to do away with the 1983 law altogether.
Wednesday, March 30, 2011
No News on Mousavi as Father Passes Away
Sad news to report on the passing of Mir Hussein Mousavi' Father:
It has been reported that since the house arrest of his son, Mir Esmail Mousavi who was accustomed to regular weekly visits by Mousavi, was continuously asking about his son's well being and whereabouts. In the more than 45 days that Mir Hossein Mousavi has been under house arrest, he was only allowed visitation with his ailing father once and under very tight security conditions when he and his wife Zahra Rahnavard were allowed a short visit with Mir Esmail in his room, with the presence of three male security officers and one female security officer. It is worth mentioning that, the presence of so many security personnel did not go unnoticed by the elder Mousavi.
This as there has been little information about his condition:
Except for a short phone call from Mir Hossein Mousavi and Zahra Rahnavard on the first day of New Persian Year to their family, there have been no other contacts or visitations; and the security forces prevented their daughters to meet with them.
Despite the efforts by the daughters of Mousavi and Rahnavard and their repeated attempts to visit with their parents at their home, located in Pasteur street (south of Tehran) where it is believed that they are being under illegal arrest since New Persian Year, security forces have been preventing them from meeting or having any kind of contact with their parents.
In these attempts which happened many times after the New Persian Year, not only the daughters of Mousavi and Rahnavard were banned from meeting with their parents or even learn about the wellbeing and situation of them, but also in some cases they were harassed and insulted by security forces. Following these illegal and inhumane restrictions, the daughters of Mousavi and Rahnavard tried to inform their parents about the wellbeing of the members of the family and their messages by shouting, with the hope that they could hear their voice.
The only considerable new development in the recent days has been the placement of new Iron bars in the alley where Mousavi’s home is located, which are assumed to be installed to the doors and windows of their residence. Also as it can be seen from the photo above a new Iron barrier has been installed at the entrance of the alley which cannot be seen from outside.
The continuation of lack of information about the situation of Mousavi and Rahnavard, increases the concerns about their wellbeing, quality of food they are given, the permanent location there are being held and their access to the basic necessities of life.
It is also noteworthy to consider that to this time no official organization or authority has accepted the responsibility of the illegal and inhuman arrest of Mousavi, Karroubi and their wives.
It has been reported that since the house arrest of his son, Mir Esmail Mousavi who was accustomed to regular weekly visits by Mousavi, was continuously asking about his son's well being and whereabouts. In the more than 45 days that Mir Hossein Mousavi has been under house arrest, he was only allowed visitation with his ailing father once and under very tight security conditions when he and his wife Zahra Rahnavard were allowed a short visit with Mir Esmail in his room, with the presence of three male security officers and one female security officer. It is worth mentioning that, the presence of so many security personnel did not go unnoticed by the elder Mousavi.
This as there has been little information about his condition:
Except for a short phone call from Mir Hossein Mousavi and Zahra Rahnavard on the first day of New Persian Year to their family, there have been no other contacts or visitations; and the security forces prevented their daughters to meet with them.
Despite the efforts by the daughters of Mousavi and Rahnavard and their repeated attempts to visit with their parents at their home, located in Pasteur street (south of Tehran) where it is believed that they are being under illegal arrest since New Persian Year, security forces have been preventing them from meeting or having any kind of contact with their parents.
In these attempts which happened many times after the New Persian Year, not only the daughters of Mousavi and Rahnavard were banned from meeting with their parents or even learn about the wellbeing and situation of them, but also in some cases they were harassed and insulted by security forces. Following these illegal and inhumane restrictions, the daughters of Mousavi and Rahnavard tried to inform their parents about the wellbeing of the members of the family and their messages by shouting, with the hope that they could hear their voice.
The only considerable new development in the recent days has been the placement of new Iron bars in the alley where Mousavi’s home is located, which are assumed to be installed to the doors and windows of their residence. Also as it can be seen from the photo above a new Iron barrier has been installed at the entrance of the alley which cannot be seen from outside.
The continuation of lack of information about the situation of Mousavi and Rahnavard, increases the concerns about their wellbeing, quality of food they are given, the permanent location there are being held and their access to the basic necessities of life.
It is also noteworthy to consider that to this time no official organization or authority has accepted the responsibility of the illegal and inhuman arrest of Mousavi, Karroubi and their wives.
Monday, March 21, 2011
Obama's Nowruz Message
"Though times may seem dark, I want you to know that I am with you" - President Obama
Persian transcript of his comments.
Sunday, March 6, 2011
Grand Ayatollah Ardabili Blasts Regime
Grand Ayatollah Seyyed Abdolkarim Mousavi Ardabili has said some major criticisms of the government:
"Without a doubt the experience of the Iranian nation over the past 30 years can be a strong basis for lessons to be taught to the popular movements.... It is regrettable and sad, however, that what is done by some in the name of defending Islam and Islamic government is against the religion, the law, morality, and human rights, and threatens the spirit of justice, search for the truth, and freedom that must be the basis for any government that is based on Islamic teachings.
No Islamic law allows insults and baseless accusations against any person or any group, even if guilt has been proven in a just court. But under the current conditions in the country, we witness that making insults and baseless accusations is becoming a common and widespread process. All sorts of people, with or without authority, allow themselves to insult persons and groups fearlessly and with impunity, without the guilt [of the accused] being proven in a qualified court and sentence decided by it, prosecuting them in advance and even issuing verdicts, while they see themselves as immune from the consequences of such actions. Undoubtedly, this hazard is a fire that, if not controlled, will spread and not only shake the people's trust, but also create chaos in the society and a dark outlook.
It is hoped that the respected officials and the honorable nation of Iran, recalling the Islamic values, will make execution of justice accompanied by kindness, respect, and attention to the religious and lawful rights of the people their top priority; that old friends will make peace; and that the history of [people's] struggle and service [on behalf of the nation] will not be forgotten, in order to prevent the country from becoming a place for both domestic and foreign opportunists."
"Without a doubt the experience of the Iranian nation over the past 30 years can be a strong basis for lessons to be taught to the popular movements.... It is regrettable and sad, however, that what is done by some in the name of defending Islam and Islamic government is against the religion, the law, morality, and human rights, and threatens the spirit of justice, search for the truth, and freedom that must be the basis for any government that is based on Islamic teachings.
No Islamic law allows insults and baseless accusations against any person or any group, even if guilt has been proven in a just court. But under the current conditions in the country, we witness that making insults and baseless accusations is becoming a common and widespread process. All sorts of people, with or without authority, allow themselves to insult persons and groups fearlessly and with impunity, without the guilt [of the accused] being proven in a qualified court and sentence decided by it, prosecuting them in advance and even issuing verdicts, while they see themselves as immune from the consequences of such actions. Undoubtedly, this hazard is a fire that, if not controlled, will spread and not only shake the people's trust, but also create chaos in the society and a dark outlook.
It is hoped that the respected officials and the honorable nation of Iran, recalling the Islamic values, will make execution of justice accompanied by kindness, respect, and attention to the religious and lawful rights of the people their top priority; that old friends will make peace; and that the history of [people's] struggle and service [on behalf of the nation] will not be forgotten, in order to prevent the country from becoming a place for both domestic and foreign opportunists."
Tuesday, March 1, 2011
Shouts of God is Great
Even as the regime arrested Mousavi and Karroubi, shouts of God is Great still are heard in Iran tonight.
Mousavi and Karroubi Arrested
The regime has finally made good their threat and arrested Mousavi, Karroubi, and their wives. Here is the story:
2009 Iranian Presidential candidates and leaders of Iran’s reformist opposition movement, Mir Hossein Mousavi and Mehdi Karroubi and their spouses Zahra Rahnavard and Fatemeh Karroubi have been arrested and transferred to Heshmatiyeh prison in Tehran, according to the Kaleme website. Information on the time and date of the transfer is not yet available.
The government of the Islamic Republic of Iran had remained silent on the recent restrictions on Mousavi and Karroubi until today when the General Prosecutor, Mohseni Eje’i released a statement to confirm the news of house arrest. He did not mention or make reference to the news of the prison transfer.
According to Kaleme, the daughters of Mir Hossein Mousavi made repeated attempts to visit their parents but received no results or answers. Additionally, over the past few days, the lights in the Mousavi and Karroubi households were turned off.
Kaleme explains that there is a possibility that the families of the reformist leaders were denied contact in order for the transfer location to be kept a secret.
Yesterday, one of Mehdi Karroubi’s sons told Saham News that a neighbour confirmed to him that the security forces had transferred his father and mother to an undisclosed location. He said, “…I spoke with one of the neighbors who witnessed the transfer…” The neighbour reported that on late Thursday night, eight regime security vans were parked in the outside area of the building complex, and after a few minutes, the vans drove away.
2009 Iranian Presidential candidates and leaders of Iran’s reformist opposition movement, Mir Hossein Mousavi and Mehdi Karroubi and their spouses Zahra Rahnavard and Fatemeh Karroubi have been arrested and transferred to Heshmatiyeh prison in Tehran, according to the Kaleme website. Information on the time and date of the transfer is not yet available.
The government of the Islamic Republic of Iran had remained silent on the recent restrictions on Mousavi and Karroubi until today when the General Prosecutor, Mohseni Eje’i released a statement to confirm the news of house arrest. He did not mention or make reference to the news of the prison transfer.
According to Kaleme, the daughters of Mir Hossein Mousavi made repeated attempts to visit their parents but received no results or answers. Additionally, over the past few days, the lights in the Mousavi and Karroubi households were turned off.
Kaleme explains that there is a possibility that the families of the reformist leaders were denied contact in order for the transfer location to be kept a secret.
Yesterday, one of Mehdi Karroubi’s sons told Saham News that a neighbour confirmed to him that the security forces had transferred his father and mother to an undisclosed location. He said, “…I spoke with one of the neighbors who witnessed the transfer…” The neighbour reported that on late Thursday night, eight regime security vans were parked in the outside area of the building complex, and after a few minutes, the vans drove away.
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