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 June 29, 2009: Regime sets up
collaborationist website to identify pro-democracy activists. FDI
has learned that the regime set up a new website on June 21, 2009, OBASH.INFO, to incite the
denunciation of pro-democracy activists by other Iranians, in yet
another flashback to Nazi Germany. The website gathers video and still
footage from a wide variety of public sources - BBC Persian service,
FoxNews, YouTube, balatarin.com, citizentube, CNN, etc, and identifies
protesters by name - much as
pro-democracy activists have done with some of the regime's thugs
who have been responsible for killing on the streets. The website calls
on visitors to name the protestors, so the website can then send their
names to the Islamic Republic authorities for prosecution.
• A MEMRI analysis released today details
the violent methods used by the regime to quell the pro-democracy
protests, including massive arrests, attacks on student dormitories,
the establishment of a special court to try the protestors, and
televised "confessions" of detainees. One of the three elements MEMRI
cites for helping to quell the protests was the "absence of
international support" for the protestors, most notably the refusal of
the Obama White House to get involved.
• On Sunday, Majles member Mullah Alikhani, read a letter from the Head
of the Leader's Office, Nateq-Nouri, which denounced Ahmadinejad and
the authorities for stealing the election and "the plunder of the
people's resources.' Nateq-Nouri said that the stolen election caused
"a rift in the people's trust for the system." This is a stunning 5-
minute presentation in the Majles - with English
subtitles.
• Faces
of the Dead and Detained.
• Group offers to
translate documents on the protests from Farsi to English
June 25, 2009: Regime confiscates passports
at airport, turning whole country into a prison. FDI has
received reliable reports that regime authorities are confiscating the
passports of Iranians arriving at national airports from overseas,
including the foreign passports of dual nationals. Arriving Iranians
have been told by the authorities they can ask to get their passports
returned "the day they decide to leave Iran."
Meanwhile, the European Parliament is actively
considering sending an investigative team to Iran to review reports of
election fraud and human rights abuse.
Preliminary reports of up to 17 people killed
during yesterday's protest in front of the Parliament building in
Tehran.
June 23,
2009: Update 2: Morteza Rezai said
to be behind "coup." FDI sources tell us that the real power
behind the Khamenei throne is not so much his son, Mojtaba, but the
long-standing head of IRGC intelligence, Morteza Rezai.
Few people beyond the inner leadership circle
have ever seen Rezai (not to be mistaken with presidential candidate
and former IRGC commander Mohsen Rezai, who is not family), as he does
not frequently appear at large public gatherings.
Two years ago, Morteza Rezai "retired" from
the IRGC, but our sources say he was put in charge of a top secret
program on behalf of Khamenei and Ahmadinejad, to guarantee his
re-election in 2009. Part of the plan, as we revealed below (Update 3
from yesterday) was for Ahmadinejad to suspend the constitutional term
limits on his office, and become president for life - like Hugo Chavez.
"All the
billions of dollars these reformists say has gone missing these past
few years have gone to Morteza Rezai to plan this coup," a former
Iranian intelligence officer told FDI.
Update 1:
Obama Sheds Crocodile Tears for Neda. Asked his reaction to the
video of the murder of Neda Amir Soltan in Tehran on Saturday,
President
Obama at his press conference today said it was "heartbreaking" and "a
problem." But he refused to speak out against human rights violations
by the regime, despite repeated questions from reporters. One reporter
pointed out, as FDI has done repeatedly, that the notion of
"consequences" was oddly missing from his remarks. Obama replied that the U.S. will do nothing
"until we know how this is going to play out."
Even more
troubling from the president's mouth was this quote: "[I]t's
not too late for the Iranian government to see there is a peaceful path
that leads to legitimacy in the eyes of the Iranian people."
Is Obama the last one to understand that the
regime has irrevocably lost all legitimacy in the eyes of the Iranian
people? Or is he just too beholden to his strategy of outreach to the
regime to admit that the voice of the Iranian people has spoken louder
than the whispered words of courtship spoken by the ruling mullahs he
has been hearing in his dreams?
Iranian dissident Mohsen Sazegara said he was
stunned and listened to the president's words with "deep,
deep, deep regret."
Mojtaba
Khamenei said to be
top regime strategist. The Guardian
is reporting that the middle son of Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei,
Mojtaba Khamenei (second from left in this undated picture), is the
real power behind t he throne. (Blogger
Potkin Azarmehr made a similar argument four years ago, when
Ahmadinejad first came to power). The cleric in the middle of the four
Khamenei brothers is their former teacher, Mojtahadi Tehrani, who died
in 2008.
Sources
inside Iran say that Mojtaba Khamenei conspired with Ahmadinejad to
"fix" the elections. This report claims that the plan,
code-named Sharayet-e Khakestari" (Condition Grey), involvement
the movement of the Supreme Leader to a secure undisclosed location in
north Tehran at dawn of Saturday, June 13 (the morning the election
results were announced), and the massive deployment of anti-riot troops
in Tehran to head off any demonstrations. The report alleges, as other
sources have done (see the document below) that
Khamenei was first told that Mousavi had won the election by a
significant margin, but that the regime was planning to announce
Ahmadinejad as the winner. This new report is so important that FDI has
translated it into English
(along with a link to the Persian original)
Washington Times reporter
arrested in Iran. The
Washington Times revealed today that freelance reporter Iason Athanasiadis, who has been
covering the election and post-election turmoil in Tehran for the
paper, has been arrested by regime authorities. Reporters Without
Borders says more
than 30 reporters and prominent bloggers have been arrested since
the disputed election by the regime.
The
latest from the Guardian's correspondents in Tehran.
June 22,
2009: Update 4: Reader identifies Ahmadinejad cronies.
 One of our readers has identified the men in the famous
motocycle picture from last week (larger picture, below). The two
men with red circles are brothers. They are senior members of the
Sarollah Basij and have earned significant fortunes - thanks to
their close relationship to Ahmadinejad, wh has helped them to acquire
several mining companies. On the front cycle is Seyed hassan
Mir-Kazemi; on the rear cycle is Seyed rouhollah Mir-Kazemi. According
to our source, they control: World of Metals (Donyaeh Felezat), in
Ardestan Yazd; Sherkat Loh-e Feshordeh Pars; Renous Company; Mojtame
Kesht-o-sanat Fadak, Tehran; and Zob-e Ahan Ezna, in Lorestan. Their
corporate HQ is located in Tehran in Ghaem Magham Farahani Street,
Alley No. 17 (Street No. 17), Building No. 18.
Update 3:
Ahmadinejad sought to become president for life. In a memo that
purports to be a transcription of private notes taken at a pre-election
meeting of Ahmadinejad's top staff in April, Ahmadinejad explains that
as soon as his re-election victory is announced as planned, they have
to move "very quickly" to replace key members of the Judiciary and
other government agencies in order to change the constitution "to
remove the 8-year limitation"on the president's term. If Parliament
interferes, Ahmadinejad tells his top aids that they will "learn a
lesson soon after we take office." Pointing to the success of Hugo
Chavez in suspending term limits in Veneuzuela, Ahmadinejad boats: "If
Chavez was able to achieve this, so can we." Read the memo.
Update 2:
Phone numbers for Iranian intelligence and police headquarters. Former
political prisoner and human rights activist Amir Farshad Ebrahimi
today released cellphone numbers for a number of senior IRGC and MOIS
officers, as well as intellience and police headquarters in Tehran and
other cities, and urged
Persian-speakers to call them to inquire about missing persons.
Update 1:
Reza Pahlavi mourns slain protesters. At a press conference
today in Washington, DC, Crown Prince Reza Pahlavi wiped
away tears as he pulled out a photograph of Neda, the 26-year old
girl shot on Saturday (see below). C-SPAN
carried the entire press conference.
• Foreign
embassies evacuate, but offer shelter to protestors. Rafsanjani makes
headway in Qom.
The
Iranian Students Solidarity Movement is reporting that more than
300 protestors have been killed by regime thugs since the June 12
elections, and provide a city by city breakdown. The same report also
lists the addresses of foreign embassies in Tehran that have been
ordered by their governments to provide shelter and medical assistance
to protesters wounded in street fighting. Many reports have emerged in
recent days of wounded protestors being arrested or murdered in
hospitals where they had gone seeking treatment of their wounds.
The British embassy announced today that it is evacuating all personnel from Tehran.
Other foreign embassies are evacuating non-essential employees and
dependants.
Rafsanjani is said
to have received support from 40 of the 88 members of the Assembly
of Experts in Qom for a motion that would examine Khamenei's behavior
in the elections, leading ultimately to his removal as supreme Leader.
FDI has learned that Rafsanjani - an unlikely leader of the moving that
could end the Islamic Republic! - has sought to meet with Grand
Ayatollah Ali Sistani, the most widely followed and most senior cleric
in Shia Islam, who lives in Najaf, Iraq.
• Graphic footage of
teenage girl shot to death by Basijis on Saturday. Her death
has sparked widespread new protests inside Iran.
June 19.
2009: "Supreme Leader" paves the
way for popular revolt. Group calls for Free Elections. Khamenei's
Friday
prayer speech rejected challenges to the election result, and
called on protestors to go home or "be held responsible for the chaos
and the consequences."
An Iranian opposition group, Marze por Gohar, said the time has come "to demand full and completely free
elections," not just an investigation into election fraud. The
demands should include"freedoms of speech, assembly, press and media,
political parties, freedom of political prisoners and fair financial
competitiveness; ellection laws free from discrimination based on
gender, thought, religion, ethnicity and under the supervision of the
United Nations. It is under such circumstances that we shall see who
the nation’s choices are and what the people want," the party said in a press
release this morning.
• Photo (above): Allegedly one of the basijis
who opened fire on demonstrators in Tehran.
• Supporters of jailed Ayatollah Hosein Kazemeini Boroujerdi
again called for an internationally-supervised referendum today. Ayatollah
boroujerdi's plea to UN Sec. General Ban Ki Moon.
• Obama
administration cuts off pro-democracy funding for Iran, from
Newsmax.com
• Former FDI board member Joshua Muravchik
debunks the pro-Ahmadnejad opinion poll from Terror Free Tomorrow
as "Junk
Poll."
• In strong show of support for Iranian
people, U.S. Congress today approved
a resolution condemning the crackdown by the Islamic Republic of
Iran authorities in a 405-1 vote.
June 18,
2009: Islamic Republic imports Hezbollah thugs to attack demonstrators.
  FDI has received these
photograph of Lebanese Hezbollah members who had been in Iran to
receive military training, and who now have been deployed during the
demonstrations to attack protestors. Notice in the picture at the right
the Farsi writing behind them. FDI has received many eyewitness reports
(see below) of Iranians who said they heard masked militiamen speaking
Arabic as they beat up protesters.
•
PARS TV does a segment today with new information on foreign troops
entering Iran at the regime's request.
• Youtube clip of
Mousavi aid, Mohsen Maqhmalbaf,
telling the European parliament that Ministry of Interior officials
came to Mousavi headquarters on election night to inform him he had won
the election. Maqhmalbaf also gave the election
results that figure in the letter below (the letter itself may be a
fake, but the information is being widely credited as true).
• Pictures
and new documents from the People's Fedaii
From the
Guardian: an Iranian reader sent in this
picture of the protest yesterday (June 17) in Isfahan's Naghsh Jahan
square.
June 17,
2009: Letter fake? FDI sources who have many years of
experience with internal Iranian regime documents believe the letter
below is a fake and is being spread deliberately by the regime in an
effort to discredit the legitimate protest movement inside Iran. But an
Iranian correspondent for the Guardian newspaper reported
this morning that the man who "leaked" the letter and the election
results, Mohammad Asgari, was killed yesterday in a suspicious car
accident.
• Better
translation of
Ministry of Interior letter. A friend of FDI has provided a
better copy (below) and a better translation of this letter, which
purports to be signe d by Minister of Interior Sadegh
Mahsouli, addressed to the Supreme Leader on 23 khordad - Saturday,
June 13, 2009. Once again,
we emphasize that we have not yet been able to verify the authenticity
of this letter. We also note than unlike most regime documents of a
sensitive nature, it bears no secrecy stamps. But we are told that
Mahsouli is IT-savvy and is likely to have typed it himself and
delivered it in person.
In the letter, the minister advises Khamenei that he is "responding to
the apprehension and cause for concern you indicated relating to the
results of the 10th elections of IRI and to your personal view as to
the prudency of renewing Mr. Dr. Mahmoud Adhmadinejad's presidency at
this critically sensitive time, and as such please be advised that all
planning and advanced steps have been taken (by the Ministry) to allow
for an announcement [of victory] in favor of whichever candidate is
favoured by the regime and the revolution, and that all actions have
been taken preemptively to
circumvent all probable repercussions by the political leaders of parties and candidates and their camps and that
all are under the microscope and surveillance." Mahsouli then provides
Khamenei "for your informational
purposes only, the accurate vote count." The first line is the
total number of votes case, then it shows the tally we listed below
(Mousavi first, Karrouubi second, then Ahmadinejad, Rezai, and blank
votes). Finally, the minister asks Khamenei how to proceed. (Download a
better image of the letter).
• A
video-grapher working for the Norwegian daily Aftenposten was arrested by police
while filming crowds on the streets.
• A well-made
slideshow
of the post-"election" protests and crackdown.
• BBC video
of Sunday's clashes in Tehran, police arrest and beating demonstrators;
more cellphone
video of police beatings; Two particularly gruesome videos of
masked police wearing armor padding cutting the tongue out
of one demonstrator and beating to death
another.
*** FDI is receiving reports from many
sources that Hamas Palestinians and other non-Iranians have been
specially trained to do the regime's dirty work. Eyewitnesses last
night (Tuesday) saw police in black masks club to death six young
people at a Tehran intersection, and heard them conversing among
themselves in Arabic.***
June 16,
2009: Update: Proof?? An anonymous blogger
has posted what he purports to be a letter from the Interior Minister
to the Supreme Leader, showing the "real" election results. According
to the text, Mousavi came in first with 19,075,623; fellow "reformist"
Mehdi Karroubi came in second with 13,387,104 votes; Ahmadinejad came
in third with 5,698,417; and Mohsen Rezai came in fourth with
3,754,218. The letter writer starts his letter by asking the Supreme
Leader which candidate he wants to declare the winner. At the end, he
gives the actual vote tally. Not having seen a hard copy, FDI cannot
vouch for the authenticity of this document.
\
Demonstrators,
Hezbollahi, surround state TV in Tehran. Demonstrators have
been converging on the state-run IRIB TV network all evening, and as
the crowds thickened, broadcasters called on Hezbollahi supporters of
Ahmadinejad to come to the streets to battle the demonstrators. Violent clashes could be imminent...
FDI has also received reports of clashes between demonstrators and
hezbollahis in Tabriz in Shiriz.
The
latest news update from Bloomberg says 8 people were killed
yesterday and 25 injured when security forces fired on demonstrators in
Valiasr square. Mousavi supporters held massive rallies again today in
Tehran's Valiasr square.
• FDI to Obama: Break Your Silence now! The Foundation for
Democracy in Iran has written to President Barack Hussein Obama, urging
him to stand up for America's principles and avoid the error made by
President Clinton in 1999, when he washed his hands of the student
uprising in Iran, claiming that America could do nothing."Mr.
President, America can do much, as you and your supporters said
repeatedly during your election campaign. For starters, America should
continue to hold up the beacon of liberty that Iranians look to with
such longing – not put it under a shroud," the letter states.
The FDI does not call on the United States to
support any particular group or party inside Iran, but instead calls on
the president to "assert America’s moral authority in defense of
freedom."
Above all, the letter calls on President Obama
"to refuse to
recognize the imposter regime of Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, and to muster
world opinion to neutralize him behind an international cordon
sanitaire until he crumbles from isolation and neglect. Download a PDF of the letter.
• Rep. Dana Rohrabacher
video message to the people of Iran: "We're on your side."
June 15,
2009: Khamenei backs down... a
bit. Faced with a challenge mounted by Rafsanjani and the
Assembly of Experts in Qom (see below), Khamenei today appears to have
backed down somewhat, now ordering
a review of election results to determine if fraud occured.
Ahmadinejad remained arrogant, taunting his opponents; reports persist
that Mousavi and 100 others tied to his campaign have been placed under
house arrest. Texting, Internet access, and cellphone coverage have
been blocked. This afternoon, Mousavi supporters march on Tehran from
Enghelab avenue to Azadi square, the exact same path that anti-shah
protesters used in 1978 and that led to a bloodbath. Reports reaching
FDI from Iran say that protesters are "equipping themselves with chains
and batons to fight back" against the security forces. And for good
reason. In this
amateur video, a man is hauled off a motorcycle and beaten to death
by anti-riot police. At least one protester was killed
by gunshots fired from a military barracks near Azadi square.
Candidate Mohsen Rezai finally has joined the other two
"losing" candidates and filed
his own complaint with the Council of Guardians. Meanwhile, the
pro-Ahmadinejad state-run news agency, IRNA, reported in the person
edition of "Iran" daily today that forner president Mohammad Khatami traveled to Cairo last
week at the precise time that Obama was
speaking there, and met with a "senior
U.S. administration official" to "share intelligence" on the
election. While this would appear to be another allegation by
Ahmadinejad in his campaign to tie Mousavi and his supporters to the
United States, Iranian observers we queried pointed out it was highly
unusual for "Iran" to mention former President Khatami. "If they had
alleged it was his brother, that's one thing. But the former president?
It's very hard to lie about that," one observer siad. Stay tuned....
Photo:
Pasdars patrolling the streets on motorcycles in plain clothes (Olivier
Laban-Mattei/AFP/Getty Images. For more of these terrific photos,
go
here:
June 14,
2009: Mousavi protests election
results; Rafsanjani in Qom. Mir Hossein Mousavi, reportedly
under house arrest in Tehran, has issued a formal protest to the
Guardians' council, asking them to annul the election results. Iranian
filmaker Mohsen Maqhmalbaf, speaking on behalf of Mousavi, released a
statement on Facebook (the unofficial Mousavi site) saying that
Interior Ministry officials came to Mousavi headquarters on the evening
of the election, telling them that Mousavi had won a clear victory and
that they soon would announce the results. Two hours later, the
Interior Ministry announced that Ahmadinejad had won by 62.6% - exactly
the same percentage they had announced when the first partial results
came in early in the evening.
Exclusive
video from Saturday:
On Sunday, sources reported to FDI that Rafsanjani has traveled to Qom to
convene an emergency meeting of the Majles Khobregan, the Assembly of
Experts, to debate the legitimacy of Khamenei's decision to certify the
election results. If this report is confirmed, it signifies an open
rift between Khamenei and Rafsanjani. FDI has been told that Rafsanjani
is "counting the votes" among fellow Majles Khobregan members to remove
Khamenei as Supreme Leader - a dramatic move with unpredictable
results.
All eyes are now on Mohsen Rezai, the former Revolutionary
Guards chief and bit player in the presidential election. Rezai
commands enormous respect and allegiance among senior Revolutionary
Guards officers. Initially, he accepted the official results giving the
election to Ahmadinejad. But late on Saturday, he sent a letter to the
Interior Ministry, demanding that they release detailed election
results, ballot box by ballot box. If Rezai puts his formidable
influence firmly behind Rafsanjani and Mousavi, then all bets are off
and Iran could be headed for armed clashes, with rival factions within
the IRGC supporting Ahmadinejad and Mousavi.
One unconfirmed report we have seen allegedly from "reliable sources
from inside the Ministry of Interior" in Tehran gave Mousavi 57.2% of
ballots counted, and Ahmadinejad 28%. Rezai won 2.7 million votes, or
7.2%, and Karubi got 2.2 million votes, or 6%, with 1.6% of the 37.4
million votes cast indicating no vote.
Video
from Channel 4 in London
Italian TV
video of street clashes and shouts of "Death to Dictators"
June 13,
2009: Riots erupt in Tehran.  Violent
confrontations broken out on Saturday in Tehran
between Mousavi supporters and riot-control police. Supreme Leader
Khamenei has refused appeals from Mousavi and his supporters to examine
the election results. In a TV address on Friday night, Khamenei called
on the people to unite behind Ahmadinejad, and said
the election result was a "divine assessment."
• Sources inside Iran tell FDI that the
govenrment cut off access to Facebook, jammed BBC, CNN, and VOA
broadcasts into Iran at 9:30 pm local time. "We expect that a
phone and Internet blackout is imminent," one source said.
 • In Shiraz, the
head of Mousavi's campaign was assaulted by Ahmadinejad supporters, his
nose and several ribs were broken, and his car destroyed.
• In London,
demonstrators surrounded the Islamic Republic of Iran embassy chanting,
"death to the Islamic Republic, Death to Khamenei, Death to
Ahmadinejad, We Want Freedom."
   
  
More
pictures from Mousavi supporters in Iran....
And more pictures here
from the BBC
Short
video of demonstration on Saturday in Tehran
• Ahmadinejad
initially declared the winner; Mousavi calls result "treason." After
the initial results announced by the Interior Ministry - controlled by
Ahmadinejad - gave the incumbant president a landslide victory, Mousavi
called the results "treason" and "a dangerous manipulation." To prevent
Mousavi from organizing supporters, the security forces shut down the
text messaging system across Iran and deployed anti-riot forces in
large numbers on the streets of major cities, AP
reported. At a press conference, Mousavi declared himself
"definitely the winner." A statement published on his website urged his
supporters to resist a "government of lies and dictatorship." At 11 pm,
security forces shuttered Mousavi's campaign headquarters and dispersed
his supporters using pepper gas and batons.“It appears that a coup has
taken place in Iran overnight to force the results on other parties.
These elections cannot be considered fair by
any measure under such circumstances,” said Hadi Ghaemi, spokesperson
for the International Campaign for Human Rights in Iran. Ghaemi
said there were unconfirmed reports that Mousavi had been arrested
as he attempted to visit the Supreme Leader's office to protest the
election results.
By mid-afternoon on Saturday, however, AP
reported that the Interior Ministry had "put on hold" any further
announcements, a move that "suggested intervention by Iran's Islamic
authorities seeking to put the brakes on a potentially volatile
showdown."
As we predicted
below, the regime is now circling the wagons, deciding how to massage
the vote count to suit its ends.
ACTION ALERT:
- FDI calls on all Iranian-Americans who
support the pro-democracy forces inside Iran to contact local law
enforcement and FBI field offices to control the identity of the IRI
officials holding the polls. (See below for the Title 8
violation involved). The regime this morning has activated their website with
specific polling locations. You can find them here: Here is a PDF with a complete list....
June 11, 2009: Mousavi-Rezai run-off?? Regime
insiders are whispering tonight that the split within the IRGC between
the Ahmadinejad and Rezai factions has got the Supreme Leader and other
decision-makers within the ruling clique so worried that they are
considering a Mousavi-Rezai run-off after
tomorrow's "election."
As we've been saying all along, despite the popular enthusiasm
for the elections, the State Department money and training being pumped
into the "green revolution," it won't be the people who vote who count,
but the people who count the votes. If past elections are any guide,
the regime leadership will get together at 2:30 AM on Saturday morning,
weigh the exit polls against the popular pressure from the street and
the pressure from within the IRGC, and decide the outcome of the
election based on a calculus of regime survival.
FDI has learned tonight (Thursday) that the Supreme Leader
ordered the IRGC to hand over control for transporting the
ballots to the polling places to the Regular Army - the first time the
Regular Army has ever been granted such a responsibility since the 1979
Revolution. This shows how deep and potentially violent the divisions
within the IRGC have become. Also, a reformist website tonight posted
an answer by the Leader to an "Islamic" question by a reader, whether
it was permissible to vote for a candidate (such as Rezai) who had no
hope of winning. The Leader said, yes, such a thing is permissible.
An Ahmadinejad victory would lead to riots in the streets by
Mousavi supporters, while an outright Mousavi victory would lead to
riots by the IRGC faction that supports Ahmadinejad, our sources in
Tehran say. "Rezai represents the minimum acceptable solution for the
Revolutionary Guards," sources with acces to the leadership tell FDI.
"After this fatwa isued by Khamenei, he now has the upper hand."
We are also told that Rezai
has succeeded in getting his own observers into Ministry of Interior
vote-counting units.... This could be the most critical gain of
all.
• Regime
releases address of new polling place in Los Angeles. At
approximately 4:47 pm today, the U.S. website used by the regime to
publicize polling places for tomorrow added a new address: The Westin Hotel at 5400 West
Century Blvd (near LAX) in Los Angeles. Get
directions. It would appear that they feared action by opposition
activists and so only released the identity of this location at the
last minute.
FDI is also hearing of an additional location in the
Washington, DC area - the Hilton, in
McLean, Va - and the Grand
Hyatt of New York at 42nd and Lexington. (Note: the Hyatts are
owned by the family of Penny Pritzger, a major Obama fund-raiser). Here is a PDF with the updated
list....
Congressman
Gus Bilirakis
(R, FL) writes to Sec. State Hillary Clinton, seeking action against
Islamic Republic polling places. Rep. Bilirakis said that
Iranian diplomats traveling beyond the 25 mile radius of their official
places of residence would be "subject to arrest." He also stated that
allowing the Islamic regime to organize polling in the U.S. "raises
questions with regard to how the U.S. can possibly participate in
legitimizing these grossly illegitimate elections by a state sponsor of
terror." Read the full
letter.
Unpredictable
polls... Opinion
polls in Iran wildly vary, with pro-IRGC newsites claiming that
Ahmadinejad will win by a decisive margin, and pro-Mousavi newspapers
claiming that he will win. The latest from Asr
Iran (thanks to Ali Alfoneh at AEI and their excellent irantracker website)
shows just how wildly unpredictable the polls can be: it shows Mohsen
Rezai (in light blue) climbing up from near zero to beat Ahmadinejad
(red), just below the winner, Mousavi (in green). So we get back to the Josef Stalin theory of elections in
undemocratic states: It's not the people who vote that count, it's the
people who count the votes. And they are solidly in Ahmadinejad's camp
- even though FDI learned overnight
from sources in Tehran that the regular army is calling on officers to
vote for Mousavi.
Top
IRGC officer says "velvet revolution will be crushed at inception." The
head of the IRGC political division, Yadollah Javani, told the IRGC
publication Sobhe Sadegh that the
IRGC would crush any effort to launch a "color" revolution in Iran.
(Complete text in Farsi here and here).
Javani referred to the past events such as the reformists'
sit-in during the Sixth Majles and the July 9, 1999 student uprising as
attempts directed by the West and "Zionists" to overthrow the Iranian
regime. He mentioned Freedom House as a CIA affiliate and a promoter of
color revolutions. For more election news, and other threats to
Mousavi's alleged "green" revolution, see today's Newsmax.
Today's BBC
Persian service reports that the regime banned any gathering in the
streets of Tehran of more than three people, and has deployed 200,000
police and 50,000 bassijis nationwide.
June 10,
2009: FDI writes to Secretary of State Hillary Clinton. FDI has
sent a letter to Secretary of State Hillary Clinton today, urging her to stop State Department
interference with Voice of America’s Persian Service, and to enforce the law on Friday
when Iranian regime officials in the United States will attempt to open
35 election sites around the country.
The FDI letter notes that VOA editors have “disinvited”
previously-booked guests because of their position in favor of
boycotting this Friday’s vote in Iran, and reminds Secretary Clinton
that even the State Department’s choice – so-called “reformist” Mir
Hossein Mousavi – is no friend of America or of the Iranian people.
The letter also asks Secretary Clinton to uphold the law that restricts
Iranian diplomats from traveling more than 25 miles outside of their
posting (Washington, DC or New York), and to prosecute under Title
8, U.S. Code, any U.S. Persons officiating at the balloting places
on behalf of a foreign sovereign. (Taking an oath to a foreign
sovereign leads to loss of U.S. Citizenship). Download a PDF
copy of the FDI letter.
Latest
election developments:
- According to Saeed
Behbehani of MihanTV, a U.S. government emissary met in Dubai two weeks
ago with Mehdi Khazali, campaign manager for Mir Hossein Mousavi,
bringing assurances of U.S. government support for his campaign. So
far, organizations such as "One
Million Signatures"
inside Iran, which is funded through NGO's getting State Department
fnding, have been mobilized in favor of Mousavi in the election. For 30
years, Iranian women have been knocking their heads on the doors of
Western "feminist" organizations, seeking - if not help, at least
sympathy. Until now, they have been given the brush-off. But with a
"reformist" in the White House, "reformists" in Iran have access s to
campaign war chests, VOA Persian Service, National Endowment for
Democracy grants, and more.
- Rafsanjani asks Supreme
Leader to rein in Ahmadinjad and quash
corruption allegations
- Askar Oladi
says whoever wins, the
Islamic Republic is the victor.
- Regime
agents in the United States remain cagey on location of 35 polling
places. Fearing interference from opposition groups, the regime
has yet to reveal the precise location of the ballot boxes for this
Friday's vote. The website they have set up to coordinate
voting has been registered in Bellevue, Washington, through several layers of cut-outs to
obscure the manner in which the regime is directing the voting
operation. Here's a
screenshot of their map of the US with the 35 polling places
indicated with red dots, just in case they try to take it down....
- David
Albright, at ISIS, reveals that Mousavi played a "small but important
role" in the original contacts with the A.Q. Khan network for uranium
enrichment gear. In an email sent out today, Albright said that
the November
2007 IAEA report revealed that Mousavi endorsed the decision to
acquire nuclear technology from the Khan network when he was primse
minister. "In 2007, Iran provided the IAEA with a copy of a
“confidential communication” between the AEOI and Prime Minister
Mousavi dated March 5, 1987 in which the AEOI President stated that
Iran’s activities with the Khan network “should be treated fully
confidentially,”" Albright writes. "The communication was intended in
part to substantiate Iran’s assurances to the IAEA that there was no
military dimension to its centrifuge program. Mousavi effectively
approved Iran’s use of the black market to pursue its secret gas
centrifuge program. This decision, made more than two decades ago, may
not reflect Mr. Mousavi's current thinking regarding Iran's nuclear
program or nuclear proliferation in general, but it is worth being
aware of."
June 7, 2009:
Khamenei advisor says "No!"
to Obama. A
top advisor and propagandist for Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei wrote in
an editorial appearing this morning in Tehran that the Islamic Republic
has "logical preconditions" for any talks with the United States.
Writing in Kayhan, Hossein
Sharimadari
said that while Obama's Cairo speech on June 4 demonstrated his
willingness to take "the first initial steps towards better relations
with the Islamic Republic," the regime also has "logical preconditions which must be met"
before any talks can begin. "We seek the return of various rights that
the United States has stripped from us," Shariatmadari wrote.
Shariatmadari is an IRGC brigadier general, and has extensive ties to
the intelligence services. Kayhan is considered the "mouthpiece" of the
intelligence ministry.
In his June 7, 2009 editorial, Shariatmadari wrote that the regime was
demanding that the following "preconditions" be met before any talks
with the U.S. could begin:
- The U.S. must suspend the four
US-initiated UN Security Council resolutions on Iran;
- The U.S. must release frozen assets'
- The U.S. must criminally try and convict
the commander of the USS Vincennes, William
C. Rogers III (the ship that accidentally shot down an Iranian Airbus
in 1988; the U.S. apologized and paid reparations to the families).
- "Criminals" (meaning Iranian opposition
activists) who fled Iran must be sent back
- The U.S. must recognize Hamas and Hezbollah
as government representatives.
June 7, 2009: U.S. government supports
reformists in Iranian election. The U.S. State Department has sent
a letter to employees and editors at the Persian service of Voice of America,
requiring them to support reformists Mehdi Karrubi and Mir Hossein
Musavi-Khamenei in the June 12 elections, and to ban individuals and
groups from VOA programs who are calling for a boycott of the elections,
FDI has learned. As of today, all major opposition groups inside Iran are calling for a boycott. So are
prominent personalities such as Nobel Peace Prize winner Shirin Ebadi,
student leader Heshmat Tabaradi, jAbbas Amir Entezam (the longest
serving political prisoner in Iran's history), and Dr. Mohammad Maleki,
former head of Tehran university.
Groups calling for a boycott include: the Iranian National Front, the
Iran Nation's Party, Iran Party, Marze Por Gohar Party, PJAK, the
Kurdish
Democratic Party of Iran, Komeleh, the People of Balouchestan party,
the Pan Iranist Party, and the Organization of Iranian People's Fedaii
Guerillas. Iranian Kurdish students protested
the elections last month, criticizing the candidates' refusal to
grant Kurds and other minorities their rights.
Marze Por Gohar spokesman Roozbeh Farahanipour, a leader of the 1999
student rebellion in Tehran, was scheduled to appear on a VOA program
today, but received a call from editors yesterday cancelling his
appearance because his party has called for a boycott of the upcoming
presidential elections.
Regime leaders repeatedly have called on Iranians to vote and made it
clear that they view high turnout as an expression of support for the
regime. Expediency Council leader Ali Akbar hashemi-Rafsanjani has said
anything less than 40 million votes cast will be a "defeat" for the
regime, while anything more than that will be a victory. Supreme Leader
Ali Khamenei has made several speeches calling on Iranians to vote in
order to show the "legitimacy" of the Islamic Republic regime. The
regime is also hoping to lure overseas iranians into supporting the
regime, and plans to set up 35 polling stations in the United States
alone. Iranian opposition groups are vowing to shut them down through
legal action and through protests.
June 6, 2009: FoxNews
quotes FDI president
on Obama's Middle East speech. "Timmerman said Obama should
have appealed to the Iranian citizens' right to choose their leader and
pointed out that the elections being held this month are a "sham" and a
"farce" because all of the candidates have been handpicked by the
supreme leader," FoxNews
reported. "'Obama... believes
he can reach
accommodations with an ideological regime, and it shows he does not
understand the nature of the regime,'" Timmerman said.
June 5, 2009: Mud-slinging
intensifies in
elections; Newsmax banned by MOIS. Wednesday's live televised
debate between Ahmadinejad and Mousavi was full of fireworks, with the
candidates accusing each other of corruption and secretly consorting
with the United States. As a result of Newsmax
coverage of the debate, MOIS today cut off access to the
center-right website inside Iran, alleging it was "hostile to the
Islamic Republic of Iran." During a speech today in Esfahan,
Ahmadinejad told followers that "a
group of gangsters took control of the regime five to six years after
the revolution, and their only thought has been to line their
pockets and pad their bank accounts," according to state media accounts
in Iran. Ahmadinejad promised to "name names" later in the evening, but
then said he was being called back unexpectedly to Tehran.
Payandeh, a website close
to former president Rafsanjani, accused Ahmadinejad this afternoon of sending $2 billion in cash out of Iran "in
suitcases," and demanded to know where they money had gone.
(Our guess: to Hezbollah and Hamas.) Appearing in Zirjan this evening,
Mousavi told his supporters they had a right to know "what happened to
those billions that disappeared."
And the mud-slinging continues: Also today, Aftab news reported that
foremr Tehran mayor Karbaschi slammed Ahmadinejad, calling his cabinet
members "gangsters who are trying to change the course of teh
revolution." He repeated claims that Mousavi made during Wednesday's
debate that the bank account of Interior Minister Sadeq Mahsouli, an
IRGC general, contains billions of dollars in illgotten gains.
"After this election, they won't be able to put anyone in jail any more
for talking about corruption," said Roozbeh Farahanipour, a
spokesman for the opposition Marzeporgohar party, which is calling for
a boycott of the vote.
Rafsanjani-supported Press
TV said today that Wednesday's debate was watched by 50 million
people and was a "game changer." Meanwhile, in a late night statement,
Mousavi told reporters in Tehran that "the green freedom revolution has
just begun," a reference to the bright green colored scarf he has
adopted as a symbol of his campaign.
"Whoever is declared the winner in the election will be the one who
does the best job at cheating, with the approval of Khamenei," said
U.S.-based dissident, Sardar Haddad. The Interior Minister - controlled
by Ahmadninejad's crony, Gen. Mahsouli - is in charge of the election
and will count the ballots. If past elections are any measure, a winner
will be declared at 2:35 AM - just hours after the polls close -
despite the remoteness of many of Iran's provinces.
As Josef
Stalin liked to say, "it's not the people who vote that count. It's the
people who count the votes."
June 4, 2009: FDI joins 20th anniversary of
Tienanmen square massacre. The Foundation for Democracy in Iran
is proud to join with Chinese freedom-lovers in commemorating the 20th
anniversary of the Tienanmen square massacre. Like the many young
Chinese men and women who saw in the Statue of Liberty a beacon of
hope, young Iranians see in America's founding documents and ideals a
hope for their own future as an independent nation, secular, and united
in freedom. Go to Initiatives
for China for more on the June 4 commemoration events.
June 3, 2009: FDI president
Kenneth R. Timmerman exposes Mir Hossein Mousavi's role in the creation
of Hezbollah at Newsmax.com
May 27, 2009: Update on Ayatollah
Borujerdi. Sources close to dissident ayatollah Borujerdi tell
FDI this morning from Iran that the jailed cleric, who went on a hunger
strike several weeks ago to protest his imprisonment, was taken to the
prison hospital a week ago and has been held incommunicado since then.
"We have had no news from him whatsoever for the past week," a source
close to the family told FDI. Borujerdi supporters also expressed
frustration that letters they have sent to Javier Solana, the European
Union's top diplomat, and to Human Rights Watch, have gone without
response. "They never answered us. Only you and Amnesty International
have paid any attention to Ayatollah Borujerdi's case," they said.
May 26, 2009: "Devil
worshippers" arrested. Just two days after a popular heavy
metal promotor was
interviewed in Persian on Voice of America, the regime police said they
had arrested 104 "devil worshippers"in the city of Shiraz. "Devil worshippers" is a regime euphemism for metal fans.
The promoter, 35-year old Iranian-American who calls herself Metal Sanaz, appeared in
a two-part interview on VOA television on May 23-24; the metal fans
were arrested in Iran on the 25th. She condemned the arrests in a statement
released today.
In announcing the arrests, the IRGC said,
"we see the hand of our enemy using the youth as a missile
against us," and called the young people under arrest "unholy beats"
and "Devil worshippers." According to Metal Sanaz, there are hundreds
of metal bands in Tehran alone, and several million metal-heads in
Iran, mostly young people between the ages of 14-25. Here is a video-clip
of Metal Sanaz in her own words.
May 20, 2009: Regime newspaper
blasts Obama for "nothing new." Pro-regime Asr Iran daily
picks up the latest column by FDI president Kenneth Timmerman in the Washington
Times, called "Obama in Wonderland."
While President Obama continues to insist that the U.S. has engaged in
"no diplomacy" with Iran for the past eight years, Timmerman points out
that the Bush administration conducted no fewer than 28 high level
meetings with Iranian government officials starting in November 2001.
"The notion that the Bush administration "never talked to Iran" is the
founding myth of Mr. Obama's foreign policy. Mr. Obama repeated it at
every occasion during the campaign and has repeated it since. It is
patently false," Timmerman writes.
The column also debunks the notion that the Iranian regime offered a
"grand bargain" to the United States in May 2003, which Bush
administration neoconservatives rejected out of ideological zeal.
According to former
deputy secretary of state Richard Armitage, it was State Department
diplomats on the Near East desk who concluded that the offer was bogus
and advised against pursuing it.
May 22, 2009: Iranians protest
during Mussavi rally. For those in the West who believe that
former prime minister Mir Hossein Mussavi-Khamenei is a pro-Western
"moderate" who can offer "hope" and "change" to Iranians, our advice is
that they watch this
short video clip of a Mussavi campaign event today in Iran. Young
people can be heard chanting "Death to dictators" during the speech.
May 6, 2009: Dissident cleric
allegedly tortured. A dissident Iranian cleric who was arrested
with hundreds of his followers in 2006 was tortured in prison Tuesday
after issuing a statement urging the United Nations to oversee a
referendum in Iran, his supporters told FDI today. Jailed cleric Seyed
Hossein Kazemeini Borujerdi contends the referendum is needed to allow
“young and old generations to choose their government independently.”
Borujerdi's open letter to U.N. Secretary General Ban Ki-moon said the
regime jailed him because he “objected to the joining of religion with
politics” by the Iranian regime. He is one of several senior clerics a
Special Court for the Clergy has convicted because they reject the
doctrine of absolute clerical rule enshrined in the Islamic Republic’s
constitution. Read
more at Newsmax.com
March 21, 2009: Khamenei slams Obama Nowruz
message. In what can only be called a slap in the face,  Ayatollah
Khamenei, the "Supreme Leader" of the Islamic Republic, rejected
President Obama's Nowruz message of "friendship" toward the Islamic
Republic of Iran leaders, saying that Obama has "insulted the Islamic
Republic of Iran from the first day." Perhaps thinking that words of
hope and change would resonate with Iran's ruling clerics, Obama
said he wanted to "speak directly to the leaders and people of the Islamic Republic of Iran." But as Iranian
pro-democracy activist Mani
Aryamand noted, "the people of Iran are called just that. There is
no such thing as people of [the] Islamic republic of Iran."
Obama's evocation of the pre-Islamic festival of Nowruz as embdoying a
cherished tradition of the ruling clerics demonstrates a pitiful
ignorance of recent Iranian history, since Islamic Republic leaders
tried to absolish Nowruz after seizing power in 1979 and have only
allowed its continued celebration because they were incapable of
preventing it. In our view, rather than offering concession after
concession to a bloodthirsty leadership that has shown no inclination
to negotiate over anything it considers essential, the president would
have better served America's interests by demonstrating the natural
affinities between America and the Iranian people in their struggle for
freedom.
The Islamic Republic leaders demonstrated their commitment to freedom
on March 19, when they murdered
29-year old blogger Omid Mirsayafi in Evin prison. Mirsayafi was
sentenced to 30 months in jail last month for "insulting" Supreme
Leader Ali Khamenei. The regime claim he commited suicide.
As can be expected, the regime's chief apologist in America, Trita
Parsi, welcomed Obama's Nowruz speech , calling it "unprecedented,
extremely positive." In fact, President Bush regularly issued
Nowruz greetings, which he addressed to the Iranian people, so the
notion that a U.S. president would do such a thing has a significant
precedent, which Obama ignored.
March 4, 2009: Obama making
big mistake, says Iranian oppposition leader. In
an extensive interview with FDI president Kenneth Timmerman that
appeared at Newsmax.com, the leader of the Iran Nation's Party
chastized U.S. policymakers who think that talking to the regime will
change its behavior. “We believe the United States should talk to the
Iranian people, not to the regime,” said Khosrow Seif, 73. [seen at right with picture of former prime
minister Mossadeq. Photo copyright© Kenneth R. Timmerman]
Recalling his own role in the popular movement against the Shah in the
1970s, Seif said the United States should learn from its past mistakes
and not support a dictator against the people, as it did with the Shah.
“The last time the United States had relations with Iran was to help
the regime, to support the Shah against the people and keep him in
power. The type of relationship I would like to see is just the
opposite to that, for the United States to support the people of Iran
against the regime," he said. Read
the full article here.
Feb. 10, 2009: Queen Elizabeth
congratulates the Islamic Republic for "national" day. In a brief notice on
her official website, the Queen of England sent her greetings to
the ruling clerics of the Islamic Republic of Iran. She is the only
foreign leader we know of who has ever referred to the anniversary of
the Khomeinist revolution as Iran's "national" day. For the record, the
Islamic Republic itself has decreed April 1 - not February 10 - as its
"independence day," because that was the day in 1980 that the Islamic Republic regime was officially decreed. Many Iranians
consider their true independence day to be August 5, the anniversary
of the 1906 constitutional revolution).
Iranians have long suspected the British government of interfering in
Iran's internal affairs; some have accused Britain of conspiring with
Khomeini in 1979 to bring down the Shah. The Queen's statement could
have been written by modern Iranian novelist Iraj Pezeshkzad, whose comic hero,
dear Uncle Napolean, saw a
British hand behind every ill of Iranian society.
Feb. 9, 2009: Khatami declares
for
president, as opposition group releases documents tying him to serial
murders. Former president Hojjat-ol elsam Mohammad Khatami,
known as a "reformer" in the West, has finally made up his mind after
weeks of hesitation, and now says he will challenge Ahmadinejad in the
June presidential elections. But Khatami faces opposition from all
fronts, including from many of the
people who elected him in 1997, who accuse him of quashing the student
movement in 1999, and of using a pretense of liberalisation to
flush opponents out from hiding so the intelligence services could
better identify them and crush them.
Now, the opposition Marze por
Gohar party has released an explosive 138 page dossier on the 1998
"serial murders," which for the first time directly ties Khatami to the
regime's effort to shut down the Military Court investigation and
reveals that the Supreme Leader personally ordered the murder of
opposition leaders, journalists, and human rights activists. As
Newsmax reports, the revelations come as the Obama administration
has repeated its calls for “negotiations without preconditions” with
the Islamic Republic leadership, and amid reports that former Defense
Secretary William Perry has been discussing security-related issues
with senior Iranian officials on Obama’s behalf.
FDI WEB EXCLUSIVE: Go here for
more information, including links to the original Persian documents
and to selected English-language translations.
Feb. 5, 2009: In concession
to Tehran, U.S. Treasury Dept designates PJAK as terrorist group. The
Treasury Department has blacklisted an
Iranian Kurdish opposition group based in northern Iraq, a move that
was greeted enthusiastically in Iran’s state-run media as part of a
initiative by the Obama administration to forge better U.S.-Iranian
relations. The Party of Free Life of Iranian Kurdistan, known by its
Kurdish acronym, PJAK, was created in 2004 and has never engaged in
international terrorism or in military activity outside of Iran.
But its guerilla fighters have clashed frequently with Iranian
Revolutionary Guards units in Iranian Kurdish towns and villages,
making it a primary target of the Iranian regime.
FDI urges the Treasury Department to reverse this decision, which
appears to be based on Iranian and Turkish government propaganda, not
facts. The U.S. decision was greeted enthusiastically in Ankara
and Tehran, where the website of Asr-Iran newspaper
called it a "positive signal" form the Obama administration.
Read more
from Newsmax.com.
Jan. 28, 2009: Update on Persecution of Christians: According
to Farsi-Speaking Christan News Network, security forces raided the
house of Hamik Khachikian, a 51-year old, a member of Iranian
Assemblies of God Church, and seized Christian literature, notes,
computers, and his personal phone book.
In a separate radi on the same day, security forces arrested two
new converts, Nadereh Jamali, 44, and Jamal Ghali-Shoorani, 49,
bursting into their homes without a warrant. All three men were taken
to an unidentified location.
Jan. 27, 2009: Religious persecution
continues. The Judiciary announced
today that it has arrested six Bahai's and a Christian for alleged
propaganda against the Islamic republic and insulting Islam, spokesman
Ali Reza Jamshidi said on Tuesday. "These people were not arrested for
their faith. The six Bahais are accused of insulting religious
sanctities and the Christian citizen of propaganda against the system,"
Jamshidi said.
This news came as Compass
Direct News reported today that three Christians were arrested in
Tehran on January 21 as part of a larger operation in which as many as
50 people were rounded up. "The arrests come as part of a tsunami of
arrests in the past several months," the news service reported. Whereas
past waves of harassment and arrests of Christians eventually have
subsided, recent pressure has been “continuously high,” with reports of
arrests in almost every month of 2008, the news service added. Compass Direct News focuses on endangered Christian
communities being persecuted around the world.
FDI deplores the ongoing persecution of Bahai's, whose faith is
outlawed under the Islamic Republic constitution, and efforts by the
Islamic Republic authorities to marginizalise and harrass Christians,
especially Muslim Background Believers. In recent years, as the house
church movement in Iran has grown dramatically, the Judiciary has
arrested priests, pastors and lay persons in increasingly large
numbers. Many have been murdered
because of their faith.
Since 1999, the Department of State has designated the Islamic Republic
of Iran as a "Country of Particular Concern" (CPC) under the
International Religious Freedom Act for its "particularly egregious
violations of religious freedom." The 2008
State Department report on International Religious Freedom
documents the arrest of 41 Bahai's and notes that the government
now requires evangelical Christian groups "to compile and submit
membership lists for their congregations" in an effort to discourage
Christian groups from bearing witness to Muslims.
Jan. 26, 2009: European Union
unfreezes MEK assets. The European Union removed the Mujahedin-e
Khalq from its list of international terrorist organizations on Monday,
unfreezing its assets. An MEK spokesman told reporters that the group
had more than $9 million in bank accounts in France alone that it could
now use for its operations.
The U.S. State Department decided earlier this month (Jan. 7) to keep
the MEK on the U.S. list of international terrorist organizations. This
has led to speculation
- not solely from MEK supporters - that the new U.S. administration
was hoping to use the continued ban on MEK activities to support
President Obama's announced intention of opening direct talks with
Tehran.
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